LIBRARY 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

SANTA  BARBARA 


PRESENTED  BY 

H.    H.    Kiliani 


UCSB  LIBKARlt 


H.    DE    BALZAC 


THE   COMEDIE    HUMAINE 


TOWER    IN    WHICH    BALZAC    PASSED    MOST   OF    HIS    TIME 
AT   COLLEGE. 


H.    DE     BALZAC 


SERAPHITA 


AND    OTHER    STORIES 


TRANSLATED    BT 


CLARA    BELL 


GEORGE   SAINTSBURY 


PHILADELPHIA 

THE  GEBBIE  PUBLISHING  Co.,  Ltd. 
1899 


CONTENTS 


PAGB 

PREFACE .  ix 

SERAPHITA— 

I.   SErAPHITUS 2 

II.   SERAPHITA 24 

III.  SERAPHITA — SERAPHITUS 43 

IV.  THE  CLOUDS  OF  THE  SANCTUARY     .          «...  88 
V.  THE  FAREWELL I2O 

VI.   THE  ROAD   TO   HEAVEN j-.-? 

VII.   THE  ASSUMPTION I^r 

LOUIS  LAMBERT ,56 

THE  SCEAUX  BALL 275 

THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS 339 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 


TOWER   IN   WHICH   BALZAC    PASSED    MOST    OF    HIS    TIME    AT    COL- 
LEGE          Frontispiece. 

Drawn  by  H.  Crickmore  from  an  engraving-  kindly  supplied 
by  M.  Le  Vicomte  de  Spoelberch  de  Lovenjoul. 

PAGE 

THE  DREADFUL  INFLUENCE  OF  THE  VOID  HAD  SEIZED  HER         .      II 
"VIOLENCE!  VIOLENCE!"  HE  CRIED 73 

Drawn  by  D.  Murray-Smith. 

A  SLIGHT   RUSTLING   IN   THE   LEAVES   SHOWED   THAT   MAXIMILIEN 

HAD  BEEN   WATCHING   HER 323 

FIFTEEN   MINUTES   LATER,  MME.    NOURRISSON  ACTUALLY  APPEARED 

AT   BIXIOU'S   ROOMS 360 

Drawn  by  W.  Boucher. 


PREFACE. 

THE  contents  of  the  present  volume  stand  alone  in  the 
Comedie  Humaine,  or  nearly  alone ;  but  they  are  very  closely 
connected  with  each  other.  And  to  those  who  care  to  trace 
the  connection  of  an  author's  nature  and  his  work,  without 
which  tracing — useless  as  it  may  be  in  some  cases,  and  super- 
fluous in  most — it  will  never  be  possible  for  any  one  to  appre- 
ciate Balzac  to  the  full,  they  have  an  interest  not  inferior  to 
that  of  any  other  portion.  In  one  of  them,  moreover,  "  Sera- 
phita,"  we  shall  find  Balzac's  most  successful  and  brilliant 
essays  of  style  as  style^essays  so  different  from  his  general 
practice,  that  they  have  raised  some  curious  speculations.  It 
is  known  that,  in  the  early  thirties,  Balzac  and  Gautier  were  a 
good  deal  together,  and  even  worked  in  some  sort  of  collabora- 
tion. In  one  of  his  books,  "Beatrix,"  Balzac  has  printed  a 
passage  which,  as  it  happens,  is  known  to  be  Gautier's,  and 
there  is  a  good  deal  in  "Seraphita"  which  may  be  suspected 
of  a  similar  origin. 

To  those  who  care  for  the  story,  or  who  are  attracted  to  the 
Comedie  as  a  varied  storehouse  of  observation  of  ordinary  life, 
this  volume  must  seem,  and,  I  believe,  almost  invariably  does 
seem,  rather  dreary  and  repellent  stuff.  To  others,  it  yields 
in  interest  to  no  volume  of  the  Comedie,  though  the  interest 
may  be  of  a  peculiar  and  special  kind.  As  most  people  who 
know  anything  at  all  about  Balzac  are  aware,  Louis  Lambert 
is  Balzac  himself;  the  "Traite  de  la  Volonte' "  was  actually 
written,  and  destroyed  by  an  irate  schoolmaster;  and  most  of 
the  incidents  brought  in  have  more  or  less  foundation  in  fact. 
The  same,  of  course,  cannot  be  said  of  "  Les  Proscrits  "*  and 
"Se'raphita."  But  the  former,  while  belonging  in  kind  gen- 
erally to  the  Etudes  Philosophiques,  connects  itself  on  another 
*  See  preface  of  volume  :  "  About  Catherine  de'  Medici." 


x  PREFACE. 

side  with  the  "Contes  Drolatiques,"  and  with  Balzac's  not  rare 
studies  of  the  Middle  Ages.  About  these  he  seems  always  to 
have  had  a  hankering  to  write,  which  was  due  partly  to  his 
lifelong  cult  of  Sir  Walter,  and  partly  to  a  curious  delusion 
that  he  was  himself  a  born  historical  novelist.  "  Seraphita," 
on  the  other  hand,  has  a  sort  of  kinship  with  other  products 
of  the  1830  period. 

But  all  the  books  are  perhaps  most  interesting  to  us,  first,  as 
showing  Balzac's  specially  "philosophic"  velleities ;  and, 
secondly,  as  exhibiting  a  side  of  him  which  is  apt  to  be  over- 
looked— his  character  as  a  reader  and  a  student. 

The  "  philosophy  "  has  been  rather  variously  judged.  It 
has  seldom  been  taken  very  seriously  ;  but  attempts  have  some- 
times been  made  to  discover  in  it  anticipations  of  later  dis- 
coveries or,  to  adopt  a  much  safer  word,  theories.  These 
anticipation-hunts  rarely  send  the  hunter  home  with  an  empty 
bag,  but  it  is  as  rarely  that  the  game  is  of  certain  quality. 
Indeed,  if  we  remember  that  even  in  the  widest  and  vaguest 
sense,  "philosophy"  was  practically  exhausted  many  hundred 
years  ago — that  new  philosophies  are  only  the  old  ones  with 
their  coats  and  trousers  turned,  scoured,  dyed,  and  altered 
somewhat  in  fashion — it  would  be  very  odd  if  a  clever  man, 
even  with  no  regular  training  or  special  vocation,  did  not  an- 
ticipate more  or  less  what  others  of  his  contemporaries  are 
going  to  think.  For  the  rest,  Balzac's  philosophy  is  of  a 
distinctly  loose  sort,  and  may  very  well  have  occurred  to  him 
in  whole  or  in  part  when  he  was  a  studious,  if  irregularly 
studious,  schoolboy.  It  is,  indeed,  very  much  of  the  kind  to 
which  schoolboys  of  some  brains  are  as  prone  as  men  of  riper 
years,  and  in  which  they  are  perhaps  as  likely  to  attain  a  result, 
or  what  looks  like  it. 

The  second  bearing  of  these  curious  books  is  more  tangible. 
It  is  certain  that  Balzac,  unlike  Dickens,  his  fellow  voyant, 
and  still  more  unlike  most  of  the  "  realists"  who  claim  kin- 
dred with  him,  was  a  very  great  reader.  In  his  period  of 


PREFACE.  xi 

production,  despite  the  enormous  expense  of  time  which  his 
methods  of  writing  imposed  on  him,  he  seems  to  have  read  a 
great  deal ;  in  his  boyhood  and  in  the  ten  years  of  his  appren- 
ticeship he  seems  to  have  read  enormously.  He  certainly 
never  attained  to  exact  scientific  or  scholarly  knowledge  of 
any  subject  by  means  of  books.  He  did  not  know  literature 
or  history,  much  less  philosophy,  as  he  knew  legal  procedure 
and  the  theory  of  speculation,  the  signboards  of  Paris,  and  not 
a  little  of  what  went  on  inside  Parisian  waistcoats  and  under 
Parisian  hats.  But  he  had  a  vast  amount  of  "  fine  confused  " 
reading,  as  the  Swedenborgian  learning  of  "  Seraphita,"  no 
less  than  the  not  altogether  alien  lore  of  "  Sur  Catherine  de 
Medicis,"  shows.  He  was  even,  as  not  a  few  passages  in  his 
reviews,  in  his  other  miscellaneous  writings,  and  in  his  letters 
show,  rather  inclined  to  overvalue  and  plume  himself  upon 
this  reading.  Nor  was  it  without  effect,  both  good  and  bad, 
on  his  work.  On  the  one  hand,  it  added  to  that  slightly  un- 
digested character  which,  with  rare  exceptions,  is  characteristic 
of  him  j  on  the  other,  it  largely  helped  the  appearance  of 
variety,  fullness,  encyclopaedic  knowledge,  and  interest  which 
is  the  complement  and  atonement  of  this  undigestedness. 
Balzac  was  really  a  "  full  "  man  in  reading  as  well  as  thought; 
and  of  this  reading  fullness,  the  batch  of  books  before  us  is 
perhaps  the  most  striking  example. 

"  Le  Bal  de  Sceaux,"  with  its  satire  on  contempt  for  trade, 
is  in  some  ways  more  like  Balzac's  young  friend  and  pupil 
Charles  de  Bernard  than  like  himself;  and  I  believe  it  at- 
tracted English  notice  pretty  early.  At  least  I  seem,  when 
quite  a  boy,  and  long  before  I  read  the  Comedie  Humaine,  to 
have  seen  an  English  version  or  paraphrase  of  it.  "  Le  Bal  de 
Sceaux"  was  an  original  Scene  de  la  Vie  Privee,  and  seems  to 
have  been  written  as  well  as  published  more  or  less  at  the  same 
time.  It  at  first  had  an  alternative  title,  "  Ou  le  Pair  de 
France,"  which  was  afterward  dropped. 

The  more  important  story,  "Les  Comediens  sans  la  savoir," 


xii  PREFACE. 

which  follows,  seems  to  me  one  of  the  best  and  most  amusing 
of  what  may  be  called  (though  it  might  also  be  called  by  a 
dozen  other  names)  the  Bixiou  cycle  of  stories,  in  which 
journalism,  art,  provincials  in  Paris,  young  persons  of  the 
other  sex  with  more  beauty  than  morals,  and  so  forth,  play  a 
somewhat  artificial  but  often  amusing  series  of  scenes  and 
characters.  In  this  particular  division  of  the  series  the  satire 
is  happy,  the  adventures  are  agreeably  Arabian-Nightish  with 
a  modern  adjustment,  the  central  figure  of  the  Southern 
Gazonal  is  good  in  itself,  and  an  excellent  rallying-point  for 
the  others,  and  the  good-natured  mystification  played  off  on 
him  is  a  pleasant  dream.  I  think,  indeed,  that  there  is  little 
doubt  that  the  late  Mr.  Stevenson  took  his  idea  of  "  New 
Arabian  Nights"  from  Balzac,  of  whom  he  was  an  unwearied 
student,  and  I  do  not  know  that  Balzac  himself  was  ever  hap- 
pier in  his  "Parisian  Nights,"  as  we  may  call  them,  than 
here.  The  artists  and  the  actresses,  the  corn-cutters  and  the 
fortune-tellers,  the  politicians,  the  money-lenders,  the  fur- 
nishers of  garments,  and  all  the  rest,  appear  and  disappear  in 
an  easy  phantasmagoric  fashion  which  Balzac's  expression  does 
not  always  achieve  except  when  his  imagination  is  at  a  white 
heat  not  easily  excited  by  such  slight  matter  as  this.  The 
way  in  which  the  excellent  Gazonal  is  forced  to  recognize  the 
majesty  of  the  capital  may  not  be  in  exact  accordance  with 
the  views  of  the  grave  and  precise,  but  it  is  a  pleasant  fairy 
tale,  and  there  is  nothing  so  good  as  a  fairy  tale. 

"  Louis  Lambert  "  appeared  first  (as  "  Notice  Biographique 
sur  L.  L.")  in  1832,  in  the  "  Nouveaux  Contes  Philosoph- 
iques  ;  "  then  in  February,  1833,  as  a  small  volume  by  itself,  a 
good  deal  enlarged,  and  entitled,  "  Histoire  intellectuelle  de 
L.  L.;"  then,  with  its  actual  dimensions,  in  a  collection  en- 
titled, "Le  Livre  Mystique,"  published  by  Werdet  in  1835. 
In  1842,  with  "Seraphita,"  but  apparently  (I  have  not  seen 
the  book)  not  with  "Les  Proscrits,"  it  was  again  published 
by  Charpentier;  and  in  1846  it  joined  the  Comedie.  "Les 


PREFACE.  xiii 

Proscrits"  first  appeared  in  the  "Revue  de  Paris"  for  May, 
1831,  and  was  almost  immediately  included  in  the  Romans  et 
Contes  Philosophiques.  Its  fortunes,  after  it  was  joined  to  its 
companions,  have  been  told,  as  have  those  of  "Seraphita." 
This  last  appeared  first  in  the  "  Revue  de  Paris  "  for  June  and 
July,  1834.  In  1840  it  became  an  Etude  Philosophique  with 
"Les  Proscrits,"  "Gambara,"  and  "  Massimilla  Doni." 

G.  S. 


SKRAPHITA. 

To  Madame  Eveline  de  Hanska, 
nee  Countess  Rzewuska. 

Alaaame : — Here  is  the  work  you  desired  of  me; 
tn  dedicating  it  to  you  I  am  happy  to  offer  you  some 
token  of  the  respectful  affection  you  allow  me  to  feel  for 
you.  If  I  should  be  accused  of  incapacity  after  trying 
to  extract  from  the  depths  of  mysticism  this  book,  which 
demanded  the  glowing  poetry  of  the  East  under  the 
transparency  of  our  beautiful  language  ;  the  blame  be 
yours  /  Did  you  not  compel  me  to  the  effort — such  an 
effort  as  Jacob' s — by  telling  me  that  even  the  most  im- 
perfect outline  of  the  figure  dreamed  of  by  you,  as  it 
has  been  by  me  from  my  infancy,  would  still  be  some- 
thing in  your  eyes  ?  Here,  then,  is  that  something. 
W7iy  cannot  this  book  be  set  apart  exclusively  for  those 
lofty  spirits  who,  like  you,  are  preserved  from  worldly 
pettiness  by  solitude  !  They  might  impress  on  it  the 
melodious  rhythm  which  it  lacks,  and  which,  in  the 
hands  of  one  of  our  poets,  might  have  made  it  the 
glorious  epic  for  which  France  still  waits.  Still,  they 
will  accept  it  from  me  as  one  of  those  balustrades, 
carved  by  some  artist  full  of  faith,  on  which  the 
pilgrim  leans  to  meditate  on  the  end  of  man,  while 
gazing  at  the  choir  of  a  fine  church. 

I   remain,    madame,    with    respect,  your  faithful 
servant, 

DE  BALZAC. 

PARIS,  August  23,  1835. 


(1) 


I. 

SERAPHITUS. 

ON  seeing  the  Norgewian  coast  as  outlined  on  the  map, 
what  imagination  can  fail  to  be  amazed  at  its  fantastic  con- 
tour— long  tongues  of  granite,  round  which  the  surges  of  the 
North  Sea  are  for  ever  roaring?  Who  has  not  dreamed  of 
the  majestic  spectacle  of  these  beachless  shores,  these  endless 
creeks,  and  inlets,  and  little  bays,  no  two  of  which  are  alike, 
and  each  a  pathless  gulf?  Would  it  not  seem  as  though 
Nature  had  amused  herself  by  representing,  in  an  indestruc- 
tible hieroglyphic,  the  symbol  of  life  in  Norway,  by  giving 
its  coast  the  configuration  of  the  bones  of  an  enormous  fish  ? 
For  fishing  is  the  staple  of  commerce,  and  almost  the  sole 
article  of  food  to  a  handful  of  men  who  cling,  like  a  tuft  of 
lichen,  to  those  barren  rocks.  On  a  land  extending  over 
fourteen  degrees  of  longitude  there  are  scarcely  seven  hundred 
thousand  souls.  Owing  to  the  inglorious  dangers  and  the 
perpetual  snow  that  these  Norwegian  peaks  offer  to  the 
traveler — the  very  name  of  Norway  makes  one  cold — their 
sublime  beauty  remains  inviolate  and  harmonizes  with  certain 
human  phenomena,  which  took  place  there — equally  unknown, 
at  least  to  romance,  and  of  which  this  is  the  story. 

When  one  of  these  inlets,  a  mere  fissure  in  the  sight  of  the 
eider-ducks,  is  wide  enough  to  prevent  the  sea  from  freezing 
over  in  the  rocky  prison  it  tosses  and  struggles  in,  the  inhab- 
itants call  such  a  little  gulf  a  fjord,  a  word  which  geogra- 
phers of  every  nation  have  adopted  into  their  respective 
languages.  In  spite  of  the  general  resemblance  of  all  these 
channels,  each  has  its  own  individuality ;  the  sea  penetrates 
(2) 


SERAPHITA.  3 

into  all  these  breaches,  but  in  each  the  rocks  are  differently 
riven,  and  their  contorted  precipices  defy  the  terms  of  ge- 
ometry :  here  the  crest  is  toothed  like  a  saw ;  there  its  sides 
are  too  perpendicular  to  allow  the  snow  to  rest  on  them,  or 
the  glorious  clumps  of  northern  pines  to  take  root ;  farther  on, 
the  convulsions  of  the  globe  have  rounded  off  some  soft 
declivity,  a  lovely  valley  furnished  with  stage  on  stage  of 
dark-plumed  trees.  You  feel  inclined  to  call  this  land  Marine 
Switzerland. 

One  of  these  gulfs,  lying  between  Dronthjem  and  Christiania, 
is  called  Strom-fiord.  If  the  Strom-fiord  is  not  the  most 
beautiful  of  these  scenes,  it  has  at  least  the  merit  of  present- 
ing the  earthly  magnificence  of  Norway,  and  of  having  been 
the  background  to  the  scenes  of  a  really  heavenly  romance. 

The  general  outline  of  the  Strom-fiord  is,  at  a  first  glance, 
that  of  a  funnel  forced  open  by  the  sea.  The  entrance  made 
by  the  waves  is  the  record  of  a  contest  between  the  ocean  and 
the  granite,  two  equally  powerful  elements — one  by  its  inertia, 
the  other  by  its  motion.  The  proof  lies  in  some  half-sunken 
rocks  of  fantastic  shapes  which  prohibit  the  entrance  of  vessels. 
The  hardy  sons  of  the  soil  can  in  some  places  leap  from  rock 
to  rock,  undismayed  by  a  gulf  a  hundred  fathoms  deep  and  six 
feet  wide — which  yawns  beneath  them.  Here  and  there  a  frail 
and  ill-balanced  block  of  gneiss,  thrown  across,  joins  two 
crags,  or  hunters  or  fishermen  have  flung  some  pine-trees,  by 
way  of  a  bridge,  from  one  perpendicular  cliff  to  another,  where 
the  sea  murmurs  unceasingly  below. 

This  dangerous  inlet  turns  to  the  right  with  a  serpentine 
twist,  where  it  meets  a  mountain  rising  to  some  twenty-five 
hundred  feet  above  the  surface  of  the  sea,  its  foot  forming  a 
vertical  shelf  half  a  league  in  length,  where  the  unyielding 
granite  does  not  begin  to  split  into  rifts  and  inequalities  till  at 
about  two  hundred  feet  above  the  water.  Thus  the  sea,  rush- 
ing violently  in,  is  no  less  violently  driven  back,  by  the  resist- 
ant inertia  of  the  mountain,  toward  the  opposite  shore,  which 


4  SERAPHITA. 

the  rebounding  waves  have  worn  into  gentle  indentations. 
The  fiord  is  closed  at  the  head  by  a  cliff  of  gneiss,  crowned 
with  forest,  whence  a  stream  falls  in  cascades,  forming  a  river 
when  the  snows  melt,  spreading  into  a  lake  of  considerable 
extent,  and  escaping  with  a  rush,  carries  down  old  pine- 
trees  and  ancient  larches,  hardly  perceptible  in  the  tumbling 
torrent.  Flung  by  the  fall  to  the  bottom  of  the  abyss,  these 
trees  presently  come  to  the  surface  again,  and  combine  in  a 
tangle,  forming  islets  which  are  stranded  on  the  left  bank, 
where  the  inhabitants  of  the  little  village  built  on  the  Strom- 
fiord  find  them  splintered,  broken,  sometimes  entire,  but 
always  stripped  of  their  leaves  and  branches. 

The  mountain,  which  thus  receives  at  its  feet  the  assaults  of 
the  sea,  and  on  its  head  the  buffeting  of  the  north  wind,  is  the 
Falberg.  •  Its  summit,  always  wrapped  in  a  mantle  of  ice  and 
snow,  is  the  highest  in  Norway,  where  the  vicinity  of  the  Pole 
produces,  at  a  level  of  eighteen  hundred  feet  above  the  sea, 
such  cold  as  prevails  elsewhere  on  the  highest  mountains  on 
the  globe.  The  crest  of  this  cliff,  perpendicular  on  the  side 
toward  the  sea,  shelves  gradually  away  to  the  east  down  to  the 
falls  of  the  Sieg,  by  a  succession  of  slopes  where  the  cold 
allows  no  vegetation  but  heath  and  much-enduring  shrubs. 
That  part  of  the  fiord  where  the  waters  escape  under  the  thick 
forests  is  called  Siegdalen,  or  the  valley  of  the  Sieg — the  name 
of  the  river. 

The  bay  opposite  to  the  cliffs  of  the  Falberg  is  the  valley 
of  Jarvis — a  pretty  spot  overlooked  by  hills  covered  with  fir- 
trees,  larches,  and  birch,  with  a  few  oaks  and  beeches,  the 
thickest  and  most  variously  colored  hangings  Nature  ever 
affords  to  this  wild  northern  scenery.  The  eye  can  easily 
distinguish  the  line  where  the  ground,  warmed  by  the  sun's 
rays,  first  admits  of  culture  and  shows  the  first  signs  of  the 
Norwegian  flora.  At  this  part  the  gulf  is  wide  enough  to 
allow  the  waters  flung  back  by  the  Falberg  to  die  murmuring 
on  the  lowest  ledge  of  the  hills,  where  the  strand  is  softly 


SERAPHITA.  5 

fringed  with  fine  sand,  mingled  with  mica,  tiny  crystals,  and 
pretty  pebbles  of  porphyry  and  many-colored  marbles  brought 
from  Sweden  by  the  river,  with  waifs  from  the  sea,  and  shells 
and  ocean  weeds  tossed  up  by  storms  from  the  Pole  or  from 
the  Tropics. 

At  the  foot  of  the  Jarvis  hills  is  the  village,  consisting  of 
about  two  hundred  wooden  houses,  inhabited  by  a  population 
that  live  there,  lost,  like  the  swarms  of  bees  in  a  forest, 
happily  vegetating  and  extorting  a  living  from  the  wilderness 
around  them.  The  unrecognized  existence  of  this  village  is 
easily  explained.  Few  of  its  men  were  bold  enough  to  ven- 
ture out  among  the  rocks  to  reach  the  open  sea  and  attempt 
the  fishing  which  the  Norwegians  carry  on  to  a  great  extent 
on  less  dangerous  parts  of  the  coast.  The  various  fish  in  the 
fiord  partly  supplies  the  food  of  the  inhabitants  ;  the  pasture- 
land  in  the  valleys  affords  milk  and  butter ;  a  few  plots  of 
good  land  allow  them  to  reap  a  harvest  of  rye,  of  hemp,  and 
vegetables  which  they  manage  to  protect  against  the  bitter 
cold  and  the  transient  but  terrible  heat  of  the  sun,  showing 
true  Norwegian  ingenuity  in  this  twofold  conflict.  The 
absence  of  communications,  either  by  land,  where  roads  are 
impracticable,  or  by  sea,  where  only  small  boats  can  thread 
the  watery  labyrinths  of  the  fiord,  hinders  them  from  acquir- 
ing wealth  by  the  sale  of  their  timber.  It  would  cost  an 
equally  enormous  sum  to  clear  the  channel  at  the  entrance  or 
to  open  up  a  road  to  the  interior. 

The  roads  from  Christiania  to  Dronthjem  all  make  a  bend 
round  the  Strom-fiord,  crossing  the  Sieg  by  a  bridge  several 
leagues  above  the  falls ;  the  coast  between  the  Jarvis  valley 
and  Dronthjem  is  covered  with  impenetrable  forest,  and  the 
Falberg  is  divided  from  Christiania  by  inaccessible  precipices. 
The  village  of  Jarvis  might  perhaps  have  opened  communi- 
cations with  Sweden  by  way  of  the  Sieg,  but  to  bring  it  into 
touch  with  civilization  the  Strom-fiord  needed  a  man  of  genius. 
The  genius  indeed  came :  a  poef,  a  pious  Swede,  who  died 


6  SERAPHITA. 

admiring  and  respecting  the  beauties  of  the  land  as  being  one 
of  the  grandest  of  the  Creator's  works. 

Those  of  my  readers  who  have  been  gifted  by  study  with 
that  "mind's  eye,"  whose  rapid  perception  can  throw  on  the 
soul,  as  on  a  canvas,  the  most  diverse  landscapes  of  the  world, 
may  now  readily  conceive  of  the  general  aspect  of  the  Strom- 
fiord.  They  alone,  perhaps,  will  be  able  to  thread  their 
tortuous  way  through  the  reef  of  the  inlet  where  the  sea 
fights  and  foams;  to  glide  on  its  swell  below  the  shelves  of 
the  Falberg,  whose  white  peaks  mingle  with  the  misty  clouds 
of  a  sky  that  is  almost  constantly  pearl-gray  ;  to  admire  the 
dented  margin  of  the  pretty  sheet  of  water;  to  hear. the  falls 
of  the  Sieg,  which  drops  in  long  streamers  on  to  a  picturesque 
medley  of  large  trees  tossed  in  confusion,  some  upright,  some 
hidden  among  boulders  of  gneiss ;  and  at  last  to  rest  on  the 
smiling  pictures  offered  to  the  eye  by  the  lower  hills  of  Jarvis, 
whence  rise  the  noblest  products  of  the  north  in  clumps,  in 
myriads  :  here,  birch  trees,  as  graceful  as  girls  and,  like  them, 
gently  stooping ;  there,  pillared  aisles  of  beech  with  centen- 
nial, mossy  trunks ;  all  the  contrast  of  these  various  shades 
of  green,  of  white  clouds  among  black  pine-trees,  of  heath- 
grown  commons  in  every  shade  of  purple — all  the  colors,  all 
the  fragrance,  the  unknown  marvels,  in  short,  of  this  vege- 
tation. 

Expand  the  proportions  of  this  amphitheatre,  soar  up  to  the 
clouds,  lose  yourself  in  the  caves  of  the  rocks  where  the  wal- 
ruses hide,  still  your  fancy  will  never  be  equal  to  the  wealth 
of  beauty,  the  poetry  of  this  Norwegian  scene.  For  can  your 
thought  ever  be  as  vast  as  the  ocean  that  bounds  the  land,  as 
fantastic  as  the  weird  forms  assumed  by  the  forests,  as  the 
clouds,  the  shadows,  the  changes  of  light  ? 

Do  you  see  now,  above  the  meadows  on  the  shore,  on  the 
farthest  fold  of  the  plain  that  undulates  at  the  foot  of  the 
high  hills  of  Jarvis,  two  or  three  hundred  houses,  roofed  with 
"  noaver,"  a  kind  of  thatch  of  birch  bark;  frail-looking 


SERAPHITA.  7 

dwellings,  quite  low,  and  suggesting  silkworms  flung  thereon  a 
mulberry  leaf  brought  by  the  wind  ?  Above  these  humble 
and  peaceful  dwellings  is  a  church,  built  with  a  simplicity  that 
harmonizes  with  the  poverty  of  the  village.  A  graveyard 
lies  round  the  chancel  of  this  church ;  the  parsonage  is  seen 
beyond.  A  little  higher,  on  a  knoll  of  the  mountain,  stands 
a  dwelling,  the  only  one  built  of  stone,  and  for  that  reason 
called  by  the  natives  the  Castle — the  Swedish  Castle. 

In  fact,  a  rich  man  had  come  from  Sweden  thirty  years 
before  this  story  opens  and  settled  at  Jarvis,  trying  to  improve 
its  fortunes.  This  little  mansion,  erected  with  a  view  to 
tempting  the  inhabitants  to  build  the  like,  was  remarkable  for 
its  substantial  character,  for  a  garden  wall — a  rare  thing  in 
Norway,  where,  in  spite  of  the  abundance  of  stone,  wood  is 
used  for  all  the  fences,  even  for  those  that  divide  the  fields. 
The  house,  thus  protected  from  snow,  stood  on  a  mound  in 
the  midst  of  a  vast  courtyard.  The  windows  were  screened 
by  those  verandas  of  immense  depth  supported  on  large  squared 
fir-trunks,  which  give  northern  buildings  a  sort  of  patriarchal 
expression. 

From  under  their  shelter  the  savage  bareness  of  the  Falberg 
could  be  seen,  and  the  infinitude  of  the  open  ocean  be  com- 
pared with  the  drop  of  water  in  the  foam-flecked  gulf:  the 
portentous  rush  of  the  Sieg  could  be  heard,  though  from  afar 
the  sheet  of  water  looked  motionless,  where  it  threw  itself  into 
its  granite  bowl  hedged  in  for  three  leagues  round  with  vast 
glaciers — in  short,  the  whole  landscape  where  the  scene  is  laid 
of  the  supernatural  but  simple  events  of  this  narrative. 

The  winter  of  1799-1800  was  one  of  the  hardest  in  the 
memory  of  Europe ;  the  Norwegian  sea  froze  in  every  fiord, 
where  the  violence  of  the  undertow  commonly  prevents  the 
ice  from  forming.  A  wind,  in  its  effects  resembling  the 
Spanish  desert  wind,  had  swept  the  ice  of  the  Strom-fiord  by 
drifting  the  snow  to  the  head  of  the  gulf.  It  was  long  since 


8  SERAPHITA. 

the  good  folk  of  Jarvis  had  seen  the  vast  mirror  of  the  pool 
in  winter  reflecting  the  sky — a  curious  effect  here  in  the 
heart  of  the  hills  whose  curves  were  effaced  under  successive 
layers  of  snow,  the  sharpest  peaks,  like  the  deepest  hollows, 
forming  mere  faint  undulations  under  the  immense  sheet 
thrown  by  nature  over  the  landscape  now  so  dolefully  dazzling 
and  monotonous.  The  long  hangings  of  the  Sieg,  suddenly 
frozen,  described  a  vast  arch,  behind  which  the  traveler  might 
have  walked  sheltered  from  the  storm  if  any  one  had  been 
bold  enough  to  venture  across  country.  But  the  dangers  of 
an  expedition  kept  the  boldest  hunters  within  doors,  fearing 
that  they  might  fail  to  discern  under  the  snow  the  narrow  paths 
along  the  edge  of  the  precipices,  the  ravines,  and  the  cliffs. 
Not  a  creature  gave  life  to  this  white  desert  reigned  over  by 
the  Polar  blast,  whose  voice  alone  was  sometimes  though  rarely 
heard. 

The  sky,  always  gray,  gave  the  pool  a  hue  of  tarnished  steel. 
Now  and  again  an  eider-duck  might  fly  across  with  impunity, 
thanks  to  the  thick  down  that  shelters  the  dreams  of  the 
wealthy  of  other  lands,  who  little  know  the  dangers  that  pur- 
chase it ;  but  the  bird — like  the  solitary  Bedouin  who  traverses 
the  sands  of  Africa — was  neither  seen  nor  heard  ;  in  the  torpid 
air,  bereft  of  electric  resonance,  the  whirr  of  its  wings  was 
noiseless,  its  joyous  cry  unheard.  What  living  eye  could  en- 
dure the  sparkle  of  that  precipice  hung  with  glittering  icicles, 
and  the  hard  reflections  from  the  snows,  scarcely  tinted  on  the 
peaks  by  the  beams  of  the  pallid  sun  which  peeped  out  now 
and  then  like  a  dying  thing  anxious  to  prove  that  it  still  lives? 
Many  a  time,  when  the  rack  of  gray  clouds,  driven  in  squad- 
rons over  the  mountains  and  pine  forests,  hid  the  sky  with 
their  dense  shroud,  the  earth,  for  lack  of  heavenly  lights,  had 
an  illumination  of  its  own. 

Here,  then,  were  met  all  the  majestic  attributes  of  the 
eternal  cold  that  reigns  at  the  Pole,  of  which  the  most  strik- 
ing is  such  royal  silence  as  absolute  monarchs  dwell  in. 


SERAPHITA.  9 

Every  condition  carried  to  excess  has  the  appearance  of  nega- 
tion, or  the  stamp  of  apparent  death  ;  is  not  life  the  conflict 
of  two  forces?  Here  nothing  showed  a  sign  of  life.  One 
force  alone,  the  unproductive  power  of  frost,  reigned  supreme. 
The  beating  of  the  open  sea  even  did  not  penetrate  to  this 
silent  hollow,  so  full  of  sound  during  the  three  brief  months 
when  nature  hurriedly  produces  the  uncertain  harvest  needful 
to  support  this  patient  race.  A  few  tall  fir-trees  protruded 
their  dark  pyramids  loaded  with  festoons  of  snow ;  and  the 
droop  of  their  boughs,  bending  under  these  heavy  beards, 
gave  a  finishing  touch  to  the  mourning  aspect  of  the  heights, 
where  they  were  seen  as  black  points. 

Every  family  clung  to  the  fireside  in  a  house  carefully 
closed,  with  a  store  of  biscuit,  run  butter,  dried  fish,  and 
provisions  laid  in  to  stand  seven  months  of  winter.  Even 
the  smoke  of  these  dwellings  was  scarcely  visible  ;  they  were 
all  nearly  buried  in  snow,  of  which  the  weight  was  broken  by 
long  planks  starting  from  the  roof,  and  supported  at  some 
distance  from  the  walls  on  strong  posts,  thus  forming  a  cov- 
ered way  round  the  house.  During  these  dreadful  winters 
the  women  weave  and  dye  the  stuffs  of  wool  or  linen  of 
which  the  clothes  are  made ;  while  the  men  for  the  most  part 
read,  or  else  lose  themselves  in  those  prodigious  meditations 
which  have  given  birth  to  the  grand  theories,  the  mystic 
dreams  of  the  North,  its  beliefs  and  its  studies — so  thorough 
on  certain  points  of  science  that  they  have  probed  to  the 
core ;  a  semi-monastic  mode  of  life,  which  forces  the  soul 
back  to  feed  on  itself,  and  which  makes  the  Norwegian  peasant 
a  being  apart  in  the  nations  of  Europe. 

This,  then,  was  the  state  of  things  on  the  Strom-fiord  in 
the  first  year  of  the  nineteenth  century,  about  the  middle  of 
the  month  of  May. 

One  morning,  when  the  sun  was  blazing  down  into  the 
heart  of  this  landscape,  lighting  up  the  flashes  of  the  ephemeral 
diamonds  produced  by  the  crystallized  surface  of  the  snow 


10  SERAPHITA. 

and  ice,  two  persons  crossed  the  gulf  and  flew  along  the 
shelves  of  the  Falberg,  mounting  toward  the  summit  from 
ledge  to  ledge.  Were  they  two  human  beings  or  were  they 
arrows?  Any  one  who  should  have  seen  them  would  have 
taken  them  for  two  eiders  soaring  with  one  consent  below  the 
clouds.  Not  the  most  superstitious  fisherman,  not  the  most 
daring  hunter,  would  have  supposed  that  human  creatures 
could  have  the  power  of  pursuing  a  path  along  the  faint  lines 
traced  on  the  granite  sides,  where  this  pair  were,  nevertheless, 
gliding  along  with  the  appalling  skill  of  somnambulists,  when, 
utterly  unconscious  of  the  laws  of  gravity  and  the  perils  of  the 
least  false  step,  they  run  along  a  roof,  preserving  their  balance 
under  the  influence  of  an  unknown  power. 

"Stop  here,  Seraphitus,"  said  a  pale  girl,  "and  let  me 
take  breath.  I  would  look  only  at  you  as  we  climbed  the 
walls  of  this  abyss;  if  I  had  not,  what  would  have  become  of 
me  ?  But,  at  the  same  time,  I  am  but  a  feeble  creature.  Do 
I  tire  you?" 

"  No,"  said  the  being  on  whose  arm  she  leaned.  "  Let  us 
go  on,  Minna;  the  spot  where  we  are  standing  is  not  firm 
enough  to  remain  on." 

Once  more  the  snow  hissed  off  from  the  long  boards  at- 
tached to  their  feet,  and  they  presently  reached  the  first  angular 
crag  which  chance  had  thrown  out  boldly  from  the  face  of  the 
precipice.  The  person  whom  Minna  had  addressed  as  Sera- 
phitus poised  himself  on  his  right  heel  to  raise  the  lath  of 
about  six  feet  long,  and  as  narrow  as  a  child's  shoe,  which 
was  fastened  to  his  boot  by  two  straps  of  walrus  skin  ;  this 
lath,  over  an  inch  thick,  had  a  sole  of  reindeer  skin,  and  the 
hair,  pressed  back  against  the  snow,  brought  him  to  a  full 
stop.  By  turning  his  left  foot,  on  which  this  snow-shoe  (or 
ski)  was  not  less  than  twelve  feet  in  length,  he  was  able  to 
turn  nimbly  round,  he  returned  to  his  timid  companion,  lifted 
her  up  in  spite  of  his  awkward  foot  gear,  and  set  her  down 
on  a  rocky  seat,  after  dusting  away  the  snow  with  his  pelisse. 


THE   DREADFUL   INFLUENCE    OF  THE    VOID    HAD    SEIZED   HER 


SERAPHITA.  11 

"  You  are  safe  here,  Minna,  and  may  tremble  at  your  ease." 

"  We  have  already  reached  a  third  of  the  height  of  the  Ice- 
Cap,"  said  she,  looking  at  the  peak,  which  she  called  by  its 
popular  Norwegian  name.  "  I  do  not  yet  believe " 

But  she  was  too  much  out  of  breath  to  talk ;  she  smiled  at 
Seraphitus,  who,  without  replying,  held  her  up,  his  hand  on 
her  heart,  listening  to  its  palpitations,  as  rapid  as  those  of  a 
startled  fledgling. 

"  It  often  beats  as  fast  as  that  when  I  have  been  running," 
said  she. 

Seraphitus  bowed,  without  any  coldness  or  indifference.  In 
spite  of  the  grace  of  this  reply,  which  made  it  almost  sweet, 
it  nevertheless  betrayed  a  reserve  which  in  a  woman  would 
have  been  intoxicatingly  provoking.  Seraphitus  clasped  the 
girl  to  him,  and  Minna  took  the  caress  for  an  answer,  and  sat 
looking  at  him.  As  Seraphitus  raised  his  head,  tossing  back 
the  golden  locks  of  his  hair  with  an  almost  impatient  jerk,  he 
saw  happiness  in  his  companion's  eyes. 

"Yes,  Minna,"  said  he,  in  a  paternal  tone  that  was  pecu- 
liarly charming  in  a  youth  scarcely  full  grown,  "  look  at  me. 
Do  not  look  down." 

"Why?" 

"  Do  you  want  to  know?    Try  then." 

Minna  gave  one  hasty  glance  at  her  feet,  and  cried  out  like 
a  child  that  has  met  a  tiger.  The  dreadful  influence  of  the 
void  had  seized  her,  and  one  look  had  been  enough  to  give  it 
to  her.  The  fiord,  greedy  of  its  prey,  had  a  loud  voice,  stun- 
ning her  by  ringing  in  her  ears,  as  though  to  swallow  her  up 
more  surely  by  coming  between  her  and  life.  From  her  hair 
to  her  feet,  all  down  her  spine,  ran  a  shudder,  at  first  of  cold  ; 
but  then  it  seemed  to  fire  her  nerves  with  intolerable  heat, 
throbbed  in  her  veins,  and  made  her  limbs  feel  weak  from 
electrical  shocks,  like  those  caused  by  touching  the  electrical 
eel.  Too  weak  to  resist,  she  felt  herself  drawn  by  some  un- 
known force  to  the  bottom  of  the  cliff,  where  she  fancied  she 


12  SERAPHITA. 

could  see  a  monster  spouting  venom,  a  monster  whose  mag- 
netic eyes  fascinated  her,  and  whose  yawning  jaws  crunched 
his  prey  by  anticipation. 

"  I  am  dying,  my  Seraphitus,  having  loved  no  one  but  you," 
said  she,  mechanically  moving  to  throw  herself  down. 

Seraphitus  blew  softly  on  her  brow  and  eyes.  Suddenly,  as 
a  traveler  is  refreshed  by  a  bath,  Minna  had  forgotten  that 
acute  anguish ;  it  had  vanished  under  that  soothing  breath, 
which  penetrated  her  frame  and  bathed  it  in  balsamic  efflu- 
ence, as  swiftly  as  the  breath  had  passed  through  the  air. 

"Who  and  what  are  you?"  said  she,  with  an  impulse  of 
delicious  alarm.  "But  I  know.  Thou  art  my  life.  How 
can  you  look  down  into  the  gulf  without  dying?"  she  asked 
after  a  pause. 

Seraphitus  left  Minna  clinging  to  the  granite,  and  went  as 
a  shadow  might  have  done  to  stand  on  the  edge  of  the  crag, 
his  eyes  sounding  the  bottom  of  the  fiord,  defying  its  bewil- 
dering depths ;  his  figure  did  not  sway,  his  brow  was  as  white 
and  calm  as  that  of  a  marble  statue — deep  meeting  deep. 

"Seraphitus,  if  you  love  me,  come  back!  "  cried  the  girl. 
"  Your  danger  brings  back  all  my  torments.  Who — who  are 
you  to  have  such  superhuman  strength  at  your  age  ? ' '  she 
asked,  feeling  his  arms  around  her  once  more. 

"Why,"  said  Seraphitus,  "you  can  look  into  far  vaster 
space  without  a  qualm ;  "  and,  raising  his  hand,  the  strange 
being  pointed  to  the  blue  halo  formed  by  the  clouds  round  a 
clear  opening  just  over  their  heads,  in  which  they  could  see 
the  stars,  though  it  was  daylight,  in  consequence  of  some 
atmospheric  laws  not  yet  fully  explained. 

"  But  what  a  difference  !  "  she  said,  smiling. 

"You  are  right,"  he  replied ;  "  we  are  born  to  aspire  sky- 
ward. Our  native  home,  like  a  mother's  face,  never  frightens 
its  children." 

His  voice  found  an  echo  in  his  companion's  soul  ;  she  was 
silent. 


SERAPHITA.  13 

"  Come,  let  us  go  on,"  said  he. 

They  rushed  on  together  by  the  paths  faintly  visible  along 
the  mountain-side,  devouring  the  distance,  flying  from  shelf 
to  shelf,  from  ledge  to  ledge,  with  the  swiftness  of  the  Arab 
horse,  that  bird  of  the  desert.  In  a  few  minutes  they  reached 
a  green  carpet  of  grass,  moss,  and  flowers,  where  no  foot  had 
ever  trod. 

"What  a  pretty  sceter /"  cried  Minna,  giving  the  native 
name  to  this  little  meadow;  "but  how  comes  it  here,  so 
high  up?" 

"Here,  indeed,  the  Norwegian  vegetation  ceases,"  said 
Seraphitus;  "and  if  a  few  plants  and  flowers  thrive  on  this 
spot,  it  is  thanks  to  the  shelter  of  the  rock  which  protects 
them  from  the  Polar  cold.  Put  this  spray  in  your  bosom, 
Minna,"  he  went  on,  plucking  a  flower;  "take  this  sweet 
creature  on  which  no  human  eye  has  yet  rested,  and  keep  the 
unique  blossom  in  memory  of  this  day,  unique  in  your  life  ! 
You  will  never  again  find  a  guide  to  lead  you  to  this  safer." 

He  hastily  gave  her  a  hybrid  plant  which  his  eagle  eye  had 
discerned  among  the  growth  of  silene  acanlis  and  saxifrage,  a 
real  miracle  developed  under  the  breath  of  angels.  Minna 
seized  it  with  childlike  eagerness ;  a  tuft  of  green,  as  trans- 
parent and  vivid  as  an  emerald,  composed  of  tiny  leaves 
curled  into  cones,  light  brown  at  the  heart,  shaded  softly  to 
green  at  the  point,  and  cut  into  infinitely  delicate  teeth. 
These  leaves  were  so  closely  set  that  they  seemed  to  mingle  in 
a  dense  mass  of  dainty  rosettes.  Here  and  there  this  cushion 
was  studded  with  white  stars  edged  with  a  line  of  gold,  and 
from  the  heart  of  each  gjew  a  bunch  of  purple  stamens  with- 
out a  pistil.  A  scent  that  seemed  to  combine  that  of  the  rose 
and  of  the  orange-blossom,  but  wilder  and  more  ethereal, 
gave  a  heavenly  charm  to  this  mysterious  flower,  at  which 
Seraphitus  gazed  with  melancholy,  as  though  its  perfume  had 
expressed  to  him  a  plaintive  thought,  which  he  alone  under- 
stood. To  Minna  this  amazing  blossom  seemed  a  caprice  of 


14  SERAPHITA. 

Nature,  who  had  amused  herself  by  endowing  a  handful  of 
gems  with  the  freshness,  tenderness,  and  fragrance  of  a  plant. 

"Why  should  it  be  unique?  Will  it  never  reproduce  its 
kind?"  said  she  to  Seraphitus,  who  colored  and  changed  the 
subject. 

"Let  us  sit  down — turn  round — look!  At  such  a  height 
you  will  perhaps  not  be  frightened.  The  gulfs  are  so  far 
below  that  you  cannot  measure  their  depth;  they  have  the 
level  perspective  of  the  sea,  the  indefiniteness  of  the  clouds, 
the  hue  of  the  sky.  The  ice  in  the  fiord  is  an  exquisite  tur- 
quoise, the  pine  forests  are  visible  only  as  dim  brown  streaks. 
To  us  the  depths  may  well  be  thus  disguised." 

Seraphitus  spoke  these  words  with  that  unction  of  tone  and 
gesture  which  is  known  only  to  those  who  have  attained  to 
the  highest  places  on  the  mountains  of  the  earth,  and  which 
is  so  involuntarily  assumed  that  the  most  arrogant  master  finds 
himself  prompted  to  treat  his  guide  as  a  brother,  and  never 
feels  himself  the  superior  till  they  have  descended  into  the 
valleys  where  men  dwell. 

He  untied  Minna's  snow-shoes,  kneeling  at  her  feet.  The 
girl  did  not  notice  it,  so  much  was  she  amazed  at  the  imposing 
spectacle  of  the  Norwegian  panorama — the  long  stretch  of 
rocks  lying  before  her  at  a  glance,  so  much  was  she  struck  by 
the  perennial  solemnity  of  those  frozen  summits,  for  which 
words  have  no  expression. 

"We  have  not  come  here  by  unaided  human  strength!" 
said  she,  cbsping  her  hands.  "  I  must  be  dreaming  !  " 

"You  call  a  fact  supernatural,  because  you  do  not  know  its 
cause,"  he  replied. 

"Your  answers  are  always  stamped  with  some  deep  mean- 
ing," said  she.  "  With  you  I  understand  everything  without 
an  effort.  Ah  !  I  am  free  !  " 

"  Your  snow-shoes  are  off,  that  is  all." 

"Oh!"  cried  she,  "and  I  would  fain  have  untied  yours, 
and  have  kissed  your  feet !  " 


SERAPHITA.  15 

"Keep  those  speeches  for  Wilfrid,"  said  Seraphitus  mildly. 

"Wilfrid!  "  echoed  Minna  in  a  tone  of  fury,  which  died 
away  as  she  looked  at  her  companion.  "You  are  never 
angry!"  said  she,  trying,  but  in  vain,  to  take  his  hand. 
"  You  are  in  all  things  so  desperately  perfect !  " 

"  Whence  you  infer  that  I  have  no  feelings?  " 

Minna  was  startled  at  a  glance  so  penetratingly  thrown  into 
her  mind. 

"  You  prove  to  me  that  we  understand  each  other,"  replied 
she,  with  the  grace  of  a  loving  woman. 

Seraphitus  gently  shook  his  head,  with  a  flashing  look  that 
was  at  once  sweet  and  sad. 

"You  who  know  everything,"  Minna  went  on,  "tell  me 
why  the  alarm  I  felt  below,  by  your  side,  is  dissipated  now 
that  I  am  up  here ;  why  I  dare  for  the  first  time  to  look  you  in 
the  face ;  whereas,  down  there,  I  scarcely  dared  to  steal  a 
furtive  glance  at  you?" 

"  Perhaps  up  here  we  have  cast  off  the  mean  things  of  the 
earth,"  said  he,  pulling  off  his  pelisse. 

"I  never  saw  you  so  beautiful,"  said  Minna,  sitting  down 
on  a  mossy  stone,  and  gazing  in  contemplation  of  the  being 
who  had  thus  brought  her  to  a  part  of  the  mountain  which 
from  afar  seemed  inaccessible. 

Never,  in  fact,  had  Seraphitus  shone  with  such  brilliant 
splendor — the  only  expression  that  can  do  justice  to  the  eager- 
ness of  his  face  and  the  aspect  of  his  person.  Was  this  radi- 
ance due  to  the  effulgence  given  to  the  complexion  by  the  pure 
mountain-air  and  the  reflection  from  the  snow  ?  Was  it  the 
result  of  an  internal  impetus  which  still  excites  the  frame  at 
the  moment  it  is  resting  after  long  exertion  ?  Was  it  produced 
by  the  sudden  contrast  between  the  golden  glow  of  sunshine 
and  the  gloom  of  the  clouds  through  which  this  pretty  pair 
had  passed  ? 

To  all  these  causes  we  must,  perhaps,  add  the  effects  of  one 
of  the  most  beautiful  phenomena  that  human  nature  can  offer. 


16  SERAPHITA. 

If  some  skilled  physiologist  had  studied  this  being,  who,  to 
judge  by  the  boldness  of  his  brow  and  the  light  in  his  eyes  at 
this  moment,  was  a  youth  of  seventeen ;  if  he  had  sought  the 
springs  of  this  blooming  life  under  the  whitest  skin  that  the 
North  ever  bestowed  on  one  of  its  sons,  he  would,  no  doubt, 
have  believed  in  the  existence  of  a  phosphoric  fluid  in  the 
sinews  that  seemed  to  shine  through  the  skin,  or  in  the  con- 
stant presence  of  an  internal  glow,  which  tinted  Seraphitus  as 
a  light  shines  through  an  alabaster  vase.  Delicately  slender 
as  his  hands  were — he  had  taken  off  his  gloves  to  loosen 
Minna's  sandals — they  seemed  to  have  such  strength  as  the 
Creator  has  given  to  the  diaphanous  joints  of  a  crab.  The 
fire  that  blazed  in  his  eyes  rivaled  the  rays  of  the  sun ;  he 
seemed  not  to  receive  but  to  give  out  light.  His  frame,  as 
slight  and  fragile  as  a  woman's,  was  that  of  a  nature  feeble 
in  appearance,  but  whose  strength  is  always  adequate  to  its 
desires,  which  are  sometimes  strong.  Seraphitus,  though  of 
middle  height,  seemed  taller  as  seen  in  front ;  he  looked  as  if 
he  fain  would  spring  upward.  His  hair,  with  its  light  curls, 
as  if  touched  by  a  fairy  hand  and  tossed  by  a  breeze,  added  to 
the  illusion  produced  by  his  airy  attitude ;  but  this  absolutely 
effortless  mien  was  the  outcome  rather  of  a  mental  state  than 
of  physical  habit. 

Minna's  imagination  seconded  this  constant  hallucination  ; 
it  would  have  affected  any  beholder,  for  it  gave  to  Seraphitus 
the  appearance  of  one  of  the  beings  we  see  in  our  happiest 
dreams.  No  familiar  type  can  give  any  idea  of  this  face,  to 
Minna  so  majestically  manly,  though  in  the  sight  of  a  man  its 
feminine  grace  would  have  eclipsed  the  loveliest  heads  by 
Raphael.  That  Painter  of  Heaven  has  frequently  given  a  sort 
of  tranquil  joy  and  tender  suavity  to  the  lines  of  his  angelic 
beauties;  but  without  seeing  Seraphitus  himself,  what  mind 
can  conceive  of  the  sadness  mingled  with  hope  which  half 
clouded  the  ineffable  feelings  expressed  in  his  features?  Who 
could  picture  to  himself,  even  in  the  artist's  dream,  where  all 


SERAPHITA.  17 

things  are  possible,  the  shadows  c?st  by  mysterious  awe  on 
that  too  intellectual  brow,  which  seemed  to  interrogate  the 
skies,  and  always  to  pity  the  earth?  That  head  could  tower 
disdainful,  like  a  noble  bird  of  prey  whose  cries  rend  the  air, 
or  bow  resigned,  like  the  turtle-dove  whose  voice  sheds  tender- 
ness in  the  depths  of  the  silent  forest. 

Seraphitus  had  a  complexion  of  surprising  whiteness,  made 
all  the  more  remarkable  by  red  lips,  brown  eyebrows,  and 
silky  lashes,  the  only  details  that  broke  the  pallor  of  a  face 
whose  perfect  regularity  did  not  hinder  the  strong  expression 
of  his  feelings;  they  were  mirrored  there  without  shock  or 
violence,  but  with  the  natural,  majestic  gravity  we  like  to 
attribute  to  superior  beings.  Everything  in  those  monu- 
mental features  spoke  of  strength  and  repose. 

Minna  stood  up  to  take  the  young  man's  hand,  hoping  to 
draw  him  down  to  her  so  as  to  press  on  that  fascinating  brow 
a  kiss  of  admiration  rather  than  of  love;  but  one  look  from 
his  eyes,  a  look  that  went  through  her  as  a  sunbeam  goes 
through  a  glass  prism,  froze  the  poor  child.  She  felt  the  gulf 
between  them  without  understanding  it ;  she  turned  away  her 
head  and  wept.  Suddenly  a  strong  hand  was  around  her 
waist,  and  a  voice  full  of  kindness  said — 

"Come." 

She  obeyed,  resting  her  head  in  sudden  relief  on  the  young 
man's  heart ;  while  he,  measuring  his  steps  by  hers  in  gentle 
and  attentive  conformity,  led  her  to  a  spot  whence  they  could 
behold  the  dazzling  beauty  of  the  Polar  scenery. 

"  But  before  I  look  or  listen,  tell  me,  Seraphitus,  why  do 
you  repulse  me?  Have  I  displeased  you?  And  how?  Tell 
me.  I  do  not  want  to  call  anything  my  own  ;  I  would  that 
my  earthly  possessions  should  be  yours,  as  the  riches  of  my 
heart  already  are ;  that  light  should  come  to  me  only  from 
your  eyes,  as  my  mind  is  dependent  on  yours ;  then  I  should 
have  no  fear  of  offending  you,  since  I  should  but  reflect  the 
impulses  of  your  soul,  the  words  of  your  heart,  the  light  of 
2 


18  SERAPHITA. 

your  light,  as  we  send  up  to  God  the  meditations  by  which 
He  feeds  our  spirit.  I  would  be  wholly  thine  !  " 

"  Well,  Minna,  a  constant  aspiration  is  a  promise  made  by 
the  future.  Hope  on  !  Still,  if  you  would  be  pure  always, 
unite  the  thought  of  the  Almighty  to  your  earthly  affections. 
Thus  will  you  love  all  creatures,  and  your  heart  will  soar 
high!" 

"I  will  do  whatever  you  desire,"  said  she,  looking  up  at 
him  timidly. 

"  I  cannot  be  your  companion,"  said  Seraphitus  sadly. 

He  suppressed  some  reflections,  raised  his  arms  in  the 
direction  of  Christiania,  which  was  visible  as  a  speck  on  the 
horizon,  and  said — 

"Look!" 

"  We  are  indeed  small,"  said  she. 

"Yes;  but  we  become  great  by  feeling  and  intellect,"  said 
Seraphitus.  "  The  knowledge  of  things,  Minna,  begins  with 
us ;  the  little  we  know  of  the  laws  of  the  visible  world  enables 
us  to  conceive  of  the  immensity  of  higher  spheres.  I  know 
not  whether  the  time  is  ripe  for  talking  thus  to  you ;  but  I  so 
long  to  communicate  to  you  the  flame  of  my  hopes !  Some 
day,  perhaps,  we  may  meet  in  the  world  where  love  never 
dies." 

"Why  not  now  and  for  ever?"  said  she  in  a  murmur. 

"  Here  nothing  is  permanent !  "  said  he  in  a  tone  of  scorn. 
"  The  transient  joys  of  earthly  love  are  false  lights  which  reveal 
to  some  souls  the  dawn  of  more  durable  bliss,  just  as  the  dis- 
covery of  a  law  of  nature  enables  certain  privileged  minds  to 
deduct  a  whole  system.  Is  not  our  perishable  happiness  here 
below  an  earnest  of  some  other  more  perfect  happiness,  as  the 
earth,  a  mere  fragment  of  the  universe,  testifies  to  the  uni- 
verse? We  cannot  measure  the  orbit  of  the  Divjne  mind, 
of  which  we  are  but  atoms  as  minute  as  God  is  great ;  but  we 
may  have  our  intuitions  of  its  vastness,  we  may  kneel,  adore, 
and  wait.  Men  are  constantly  mistaken  in  their  science,  not 


SERAPHITA.  19 

seeing  that  everything  on  their  globe  is  relative  and  subordi- 
nate to  a  general  cycle,  an  incessant  productiveness  which 
inevitably  involves  progress,  and  an  aim.  Man  himself  is  not 
the  final  creation ;  if  he  were,  God  would  not  exist." 

"How  have  you  had  time  to  learn  so  many  things?  "  said 
the  girl. 

"They  are  memories,"  replied  he. 

"To  me  you  are  more  beautiful  than  anything  I  see." 

"  We  are  one  of  the  greatest  works  of  God.  Has  He  not 
bestowed  on  us  the  faculty  of  reflecting  nature,  concentrating 
it  in  ourselves  by  thought,  and  making  it  a  stepping-stone 
from  which  to  fly  to  Him  ?  We  love  each  other  in  proportion 
to  what  is  heavenly  in  our  souls.  But  do  not  be  unjust,  Minna ; 
look  at  the  scene  displayed  at  our  feet ;  is  it  not  grand  ? 
The  ocean  lies  spread  like  a  floor,  the  mountains  are  like  the 
walls  of  an  amphitheatre,  the  ether  above  is  like  the  sus- 
pended velarium  of  the  theatre,  and  we  can  inhale  the  mino 
of  God  as  a  perfume. 

"  Look  !  the  storms  that  wreck  vessels  filled  with  men  from 
hence  appear  like  mere  froth ;  if  you  look  above  you  all  is 
serene ;  we  see  a  diadem  of  stars.  The  shades  of  earthly 
expression  are  here  lost.  Thus  supported  by  nature  so  atten- 
uated by  space,  do  you  not  feel  your  mind  to  be  deep  rather  than 
keen?  Are  you  not  conscious  of  more  loftiness  than  en- 
thusiasm, of  more  energy  than  will  ?  Have  you  not  feelings  to 
which  nothing  within  us  can  give  utterance  ?  Do  you  not 
feel  your  pinions?  Let  us  pray  !  " 

Seraphitus  knelt,  crossing  his  hands  over  his  bosom,  and 
Minna  fell  on  her  knees  weeping.  Thus  they  remained  for 
some  minutes,  and  the  blue  halo  that  quivered  in  the  sky 
above  them  spread,  and  rays  of  light  fell  round  the  uncon- 
scious pair. 

"  Why  do  you  not  weep  when  I  weep?  "  said  Minna  in  a 
broken  voice. 

"Those   who  are  pure  in  spirit  shed  no  tears,"   replied 


20  SERAPHITA. 

Seraphitus,  rising.  "  Why  should  I  weep  ?  I  no  longer  see 
human  misery.  Here  all  is  good  and  shines  in  majesty. 
Below  I  hear  the  supplications  and  the  lament  of  the  harp  of 
suffering,  sounding  under  the  hands  of  the  spirit  held  captive. 
Here  I  listen  to  the  concert  of  harmonious  harps.  Below, 
you  have  hope,  the  beautiful  rudiment  of  faith;  but  here  faith 
reigns,  the  realization  of  hope !  " 

"You  can  never  love  me,  I  am  too  imperfect;  you  disdain 
me,"  said  the  girl. 

"  Minna,  the  violet  hidden  at  the  foot  of  the  oak  says  to 
itself,  'The  sun  does  not  love  me,  he  never  comes.'  The 
sun  says,  '  If  I  fell  on  her,  that  poor  little  flower  would 
perish  ! '  Because  he  is  the  flower's  friend  he  lets  his  beams 
steal  through  the  oak-leaves,  subduing  them  to  tint  the  petals 
of  the  blossom  he  loves.  I  feel  I  am  not  sufficiently  shrouded, 
and  fear  lest  you  should  see  me  too  clearly  ;  you  would  quail 
if  you  knew  me  too  well.*  -Listen;  I  have  no  taste  for  the 
fruits  of  the  earth ;  I  have  understood  your  joys  too  well ; 
like  the  debauched  Emperors  of  Pagan  Rome,  I  am  disgusted 
with  all  things,  for  I  have  the  gift  of  vision.  Leave  me  for 
ever,"  added  Seraphitus«sorrowfully. 

He  went  away  to  sit  down  on  a  projecting  rock,  his  head 
drooping  on  his  breast. 

"  Why  thus  drive  me  to  despair?  "  said  Minna. 

"Go  from  me!"  cried  Seraphitus;  "I  can  give  nothing 
that  you  want.  Your  love  is  too  gross  for  me.  Why  do  you 
not  love  Wilfrid?  Wilfrid  is  a  man,  a  man  tested  by  passion, 
who  will  clasp  you  in  his  sinewy  arms  and  make  you  feel  his 
broad,  strong  hand.  He  has  fine  black  hair,  eyes  full  of 
human  feeling,  a  heart  that  fires  the  words  of  his  lips  with  a 
lava  torrent.  He  will  crush  you  with  caresses.  He  will  be 
your  lover,  your  husband.  Go  to  Wilfrid  !  " 

Minna  was  crying  bitterly. 

"Dare  you  tell  me  that  you  do  not  love  him?"  he  added 
in  a  voice  that  pierced  her  like  a  dagger. 


SERAPHITA.  21 

"  Mercy  !     Mercy  !     My  Seraph itus  !  " 

"Love  him,  poor  child  of  earth,  to  which  fate  irrevocably 
rivets  you,"  said  the  terrible  Seraphitus,  seizing  the  girl  with 
such  force  as  dragged  her  to  the  brink  of  the  sater,  whence 
the  prospect  was  so  extensive  that  a  young  creature  full  of 
enthusiasm  might  easily  fancy  that  she  was  above  the  world. 
"  I  wanted  a  companion  to  go  with  me  to  the  realm  of  light ; 
I  thought  to  show  her  this  ball  of  clay,  and  I  find  you  still 
cling  to  it.  Adieu  !  Remain  as  you  are,  enjoy  through  your 
senses,  obey  your  nature ;  turn  pale  with  pallid  men,  blush 
with  women,  play  with  children,  pray  with  sinners,  look  up 
to  heaven  when  you  are  stricken  ;  tremble,  hope,  yearn ;  you 
will  have  a  comrade,  you  still  may  laugh  and  weep,  give  and 
receive.  For  me — I  am  an  exile  far  from  heaven ;  like  a 
monster,  far  from  earth  !  My  heart  beats  for  none ;  I  live 
in  myself — alone.  I  feel  through  my  spirit,  I  breathe  by  my 
brain,  I  see  by  my  mind,  I  am  dying  of  impatience  and  long- 
ing. No  one  here  below  can  satisfy  my  wishes  or  soothe  my 
eagerness ;  and  I  have  forgotten  how  to  weep.  I  am  alone. 
I  am  resigned,  and  I  wait." 

Seraphitus  looked  at  the  flowery  knoll  on  which  he  had 
placed  Minna,  and  then  turned  toward  the  frowning  summits, 
round  whose  peaks  heavy  clouds  had  gathered,  into  which  he 
seemed  to  fling  his  next  thoughts. 

"  Do  you  hear  that  delightful  music,  Minna?"  said  he,  in 
his  dove-like  tones,  for  the  eagle  had  ended  his  cry.  "Might 
one  not  fancy  that  it  was  the  harmony  of  those  seolian  harps 
which  poets  imagine  in  the  midst  of  forests  and  mountains? 
Do  you  see  the  shadowy  forms  moving  among  those  clouds  ? 
Do  you  discerntthe  winged  feet  of  those  who  deck  the  sky 
with  such  hangings  ?  Those  sounds  refresh  the  soul ;  heaven 
will  ere  long  shed  the  blossoms  of  spring,  a  flash  blazes  up 
from  the  Pole.  Let  us  fly,  Minette — it  is  time  !  " 

In  an  instant  they  had  replaced  their  snow-shoes  and  were 
descending  the  Falberg  by  the  steep  slopes  down  to  the  valley 


22  SERAPHITA. 

of  the  Sieg.  Some  miraculous  intelligence  guided  their  steps 
—or  rather  their  flight.  When  a  crevasse  covered  with  snow 
lay  before  them,  Seraphitus  seized  Minna,  and  with  a  swift 
rush  dashed,  scarce  the  weight  of  a  bird,  across  the  frail 
bridge  that  covered  a  chasm.  Many  a  time,  by  just  pushing 
his  companion,  he  deviated  slightly  to  avoid  a  cliff  or  tree,  a 
block  of  stone  which  he  seemed  to  see  through  the  snow,  as 
certain  mariners,  accustomed  to  the  sea,  discern  a  shoal  by 
the  color,  the  eddy,  and  the  recoil  of  the  water. 

When  they  had  reached  the  roads  of  the  Siegdahl,  and  they 
could  proceed  without  hesitation  in  a  straight  line  down  to 
the  ice  on  the  fiord,  Seraphitus  spoke. 

"You  have  nothing  more  to  say  to  me  ?  "  he  asked  Minna. 

"  I  fancied,"  replied  the  girl  respectfully,  "  that  you  wished 
to  think  in  silence." 

11  Make  haste,  pretty  one,  the  night  is  falling,"  said  he. 

Minna  was  startled  at  hearing  the  new  voice,  so  to  speak, 
in  which  her  guide  spoke.  A  voice  as  clear  as  a  girl's  dissi- 
pating the  fantastic  flashes  of  the  dream  in  which  she  had  been 
walking.  Seraphitus  was  abdicating  his  manly  strength,  and 
his  looks  were  losing  their  too  keen  insight.  Presently  the 
fair  couple  were  gliding  across  the  fiord ;  they  reached  the 
snowy  level  that  lay  between  the  margin  of  the  bay  and  the 
first  houses  of  Jarvis;  then,  urged  by  the  waning  light,  they 
hurried  up  to  the  parsonage  as  if  climbing  the  steps  of  an  enor- 
mous stairway. 

"  My  father  will  be  uneasy,"  said  Minna. 

"No,"  said  Seraphitus. 

At  this  moment  they  stopped  at  the  porch  of  the  humble 
dwelling  where  Pastor  Becker,  the  minister  of  Jarvis,  sat  read- 
ing while  awaiting  his  daughter's  return  to  supper. 

"Dear  Pastor  Becker,"  said  Seraphitus,  "I  have  brought 
your  daughter  back  safe  and  sound." 

"Thank  you,  mademoiselle,"  said  the  old  man,  laying  his 
spectacles  on  the  book.  "  You  must  be  tired." 


SERAPHITA.  23 

"Not  in  the  least,"  said  Minna,  on  whose  brow  her  com- 
panion had  just  breathed. 

"  Dear  child,  will  you  come  to  tea  with  me  the  evening 
after  to-morrow?" 

"With  pleasure,  dear." 

"  Monsieur  Becker,  will  you  bring  her?" 

"Yes,  mademoiselle." 

Seraphitus  nodded  prettily,  bowed  to  the  old  man,  and  left, 
and  in  a  few  minutes  was  in  the  courtyard  of  the  Swedish 
Castle.  An  old  servant  of  eighty  came  out  under  the  wide 
veranda,  carrying  a  lantern.  Seraphitus  slipped  off  the  snow- 
shoes  with  the  grace  of  a  woman,  ran  into  the  sitting-room, 
dropped  on  to  a  large  divan  covered  with  skins,  and  lay 
down. 

"What  will  you  take?"  said  the  old  man,  lighting  the 
enormously  long  tapers  that  are  used  in  Norway. 

"  Nothing,  David  ;  I  am  too  tired." 

Seraphitus  threw  off  the  sable-lined  pelisse,  wrapped  it  about 
him,  and  was  asleep.  The  old  servant  lingered  a  few  minutes 
in  loving  contemplation  of  the  strange  being  resting  under  his 
gaze,  and  whose  sex  the  most  learned  man  would  have  been 
puzzled  to  pronounce  on.  Seeing  him  as  he  lay,  wrapped  in 
his  usual  formless  garment,  which  was  as  much  like  a  woman's 
dressing-gown  as  a  man's  overcoat,  it  was  impossible  to  believe 
that  the  slender  feet  that  hung  down,  as  if  to  display  the  deli- 
cacy with  which  nature  had  moulded  them,  were  not  those  of  a 
young  girl ;  but  the  brow,  the  profile,  seemed  the  embodiment 
of  human  strength  carried  to  its  highest  pitch. 

"She  is  suffering,  and  will  not  tell  me,"  thought  the  old 
man.  "She  is  dying  like  a  flower  scorched  by  too  fierce  a 
sunbeam." 

And  the  old  man  wept. 


n. 

SERAPHITA. 

In  the  course  of  the  evening  David  came  into  the  drawing- 
room. 

"  I  know  who  is  coming,"  said  Seraphita  in  a  sleepy  voice. 
"  Wilfrid  may  come  in." 

On  hearing  these  words,  a  man  at  once  appeared,  and  came 
to  sit  down  by  her. 

"My  dear  Seraphita,  are  you  ill?  You  look  paler  than 
usual." 

She  turned  languidly  toward  him,  after  tossing  back  her 
hair  like  a  pretty  woman  overpowered  by  sick-headache  and 
too  feeble  to  complain. 

"  I  was  foolish  enough,"  said  she,  "  to  cross  the  fiord  with 
Minna;  we  have  been  up  the  Falberg." 

"Did  you  want  to  kill  yourself?"  cried  he,  with  a  lover's 
alarm. 

"  Do  not  be  uneasy,  my  good  Wilfrid,  I  took  great  care  of 
your  Minna." 

Wilfrid  struck  the  table  violently  with  his  hand,  took  a  few 
steps  toward  the  door  with  an  exclamation  of  pain ;  then  he 
came  back  and  began  to  reproach  her. 

"  Why  so  much  noise  if  you  suppose  me  to  be  suffering?  " 
said  Seraphita. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,  forgive  me,"  said  he,  kneeling  down. 
"  Speak  harshly  to  me,  require  anything  of  me  that  your  cruel 
woman's  caprice  may  suggest  to  you  as  hardest  to  be  endured, 
but,  my  beloved,  do  not  doubt  my  love !  You  use  Minna 
like  a  hatchet  to  hit  me  with  again  and  again.  Have  some 
mercy !  " 

"Why  speak  thus,  my  friend,  when  you  know  that  such 
(24) 


SERAPHITA.  25 

words  are  useless?"  she  replied,  looking  at  him  with  a  gaze 
that  became  at  last  so  soft  that  what  Wilfrid  saw  was  not 
Seraphita's  eyes,  but  a  fluid  light  shimmering  like  the  last 
vibrations  of  a  song  full  of  Italian  languor. 

"Ah  !  anguish  cannot  kill !  "  cried  he. 

"Are  you  in  pain?"  said  she,  in  a  voice  which  produced 
on  him  the  same  effect  as  her  look.  "What  can  I  do  for 
you  ? ' ' 

"  Love  me,  as  I  love  you !  " 

"  Poor  Minna  !  "  said  she. 

"  I  never  bring  any  weapons  !  "  cried  Wilfrid. 

"You  are  in  a  detestable  temper,"  said  Seraphita,  smiling. 
"Have  I  not  spoken  nicely,  like  the  Parisian  ladies  of  whom 
you  tell  me  love  stories?  " 

Wilfrid  sat  down,  folded  his  arms,  and  looked  gloomily  at 
Seraphita. 

"  I  forgive  you,"  said  he,  "  for  you  know  not  what  you  do." 

"Oh  !  "  retorted  she,  "every  woman  from  Eve  downward 
knows  when  she  is  doing  good  or  evil." 

"I  believe  it,"  said  he. 

"  I  am  sure  of  it,  Wilfrid.  Our  intuition  is  just  what  makes 
us  so  perfect.  What  you  men  have  to  learn,  we  feel." 

"  Why,  then,  do  you  not  feel  how  much  I  love  you? " 

"Because  you  do  not  love  me." 

"Great  God!" 

"  Why  then  do  you  complain  of  anguish?  " 

"  You  are  terrible  this  evening,  Seraphita.  You  are  a  per- 
fect demon  !  " 

"No;  but  I  have  the  gift  of  understanding,  and  that  is 
terrifying.  Suffering,  Wilfrid,  is  a  light  thrown  on  life." 

"  Why  did  you  go  up  the  Falberg  ?  " 

"Minna  will  tell  you;  I  am  too  tired  to  speak.  You 
must  talk,  you  who  know  everything,  who  have  learnt  every- 
thing and  forgotten  nothing,  and  have  gone  through  so  many 
social  experiences.  Amuse  me  ;  I  am  listening." 


26  SERAPHITA. 

"  What  can  I  tell  you  that  you  do  not  know !  Indeed, 
your  request  is  a  mockery.  You  recognize  nothing  that  is 
worldly,  you  analyze  its  terminology,  you  demolish  its  laws, 
its  manners,  feelings,  sciences,  by  reducing  them  to  the  pro- 
portions they  assume  when  we  take  our  stand  outside  the 
globe." 

"You  see,  my  friend,  I  am  not  a  woman.  You  are  wrong 
to  love  me.  What !  I  quit  the  ethereal  regions  of  strength 
you  attribute  to  me ;  I  make  myself  humble  and  insignificant 
to  stoop  after  the  manner  of  the  poor  female  of  every  species 
— and  you  at  once  uplift  me  !  Then,  when  I  am  crushed  and 
broken,  I  crave  your  help  ;  I  want  your  arm,  and  you  repulse 
me  !  We  do  not  understand  each  other." 

"You  are  more  malignant  this  evening  than  I  have  ever 
known  you." 

"Malignant?"  said  she,  with  a  flashing  look  that  melted 
every  sentiment  into  one  heavenly  emotion.  "No;  I  am 
weary,  that  is  all.  Then,  leave  me,  my  friend.  Will  not  that 
be  a  due  exercise  of  your  rights  as  a  man  ?  We  are  always  to 
charm  you,  to  recreate  you,  always  to  be  cheerful,  and  have 
no  whims  but  those  that  amuse  you.  What  shall  I  do,  my 
friend?  Shall  I  sing  or  dance,  when  fatigue  has  deprived 
me  of  voice  and  of  the  use  of  my  legs  ?  Yes,  gentlemen,  at  our 
last  gasp  we  still  must  smile  on  you  !  That,  I  believe,  you 
call  your  sovereignty  !  Poor  women  !  I  pity  them.  You 
abandon  them  when  they  are  old  ;  tell  me,  have  they  then 
no  longer  heart  or  soul  ?  Well,  and  I  am  more  than  a  hun- 
dred, Wilfrid.  Go — go  to  kneel  at  Minna's  feet." 

"  Oh,  my  one,  eternal  love  !  " 

"Do  you  know  what  eternity  is?  Be  silent,  Wilfrid. 
You  desire  me,  but  you  do  not  love  me.  Tell  me,  now,  do 
not  I  remind  you  of  some  coquette  you  have  met  ?  " 

"  I  certainly  do  not  see  you  now  as  the  pure  and  heavenly 
maiden  I  saw  for  the  first  time  in  the  church  at  Jarvis." 

As  he  spoke  Seraphita  passed  her  hands  over  her  brow,  and 


SERAPHITA.  27 

when  she  uncovered  her  face  Wilfrid  was  astonished  at  the 
religious  and  saintly  expression  it  wore. 

"  You  are  right,  my  friend.  I  do  wrong  whenever  I  set 
foot  upon  your  earth." 

"  Yes,  beloved  Seraphita,  be  my  star.  Never  descend  from 
the  place  whence  you  shed  such  glorious  light  upon  me." 

He  put  out  his  hand  to  take  the  girl's,  but  she  withdrew  it, 
though  without  disdain  or  anger.  Wilfrid  hastily  rose  and 
went  to  stand  by  the  window,  turning  toward  it  so  that  Sera- 
phita should  not  see  a  few  tears  that  filled  his  eyes. 

"Why  these  tears?"  she  asked.  "You  are  no  longer  a 
boy,  Wilfrid.  Come  back  to  me,  I  insist.  You  are  vexed 
with  me,  when  it  is  I  who  should  be  angry.  You  see  I  am 
not  well,  and  you  compel  me  by  some  foolish  doubts  to  think 
and  speak,  or  participate  in  whims  and  ideas  that  fatigue  me. 
If  you  at  all  understood  my  nature,  you  would  have  given  me 
some  music  ;  you  would  have  soothed  my  weariness ;  but  you 
love  me  for  your  own  sake,  not  for  myself." 

The  storm  which  raged  in  Wilfrid's  soul  was  stilled  by  these 
words ;  he  came  back  slowly  to  contemplate  the  bewitching 
creature  who  reclined  under  his  eyes,  softly  pillowed,  her 
head  resting  on  her  hand,  and  her  elbow  in  an  insinuating 
attitude. 

"You  fancy  I  do  not  like  you,"  she  went  on.  "You  are 
mistaken.  Listen,  Wilfrid.  You  are  beginning  to  know  a 
great  deal,  and  you  have  suffered  much.  Allow  me  to  explain 
your  thoughts.  You  wanted  to  take  my  hand." 

She  sat  up,  and  her  graceful  movement  seemed  to  shed 
gleams  of  light. 

"  Does  not  a  girl  who  allows  a  man  to  take  her  hand  seem 
to  make  a  promise,  and  ought  she  not  to  keep  it?  You  know 
full  well  that  I  can  never  be  yours.  Two  feelings  rule  the 
love  that  attracts  the  women  of  this  earth :  either  they  devote 
themselves  to  suffering  creatures,  degraded  and  guilty,  whom 
they  desire  to  comfort,  to  raise,  to  redeem  ;  or  they  give  them- 


28  SERAPHITA. 

selves  wholly  to  superior  beings,  sublime  and  strong,  whom 
they  are  fain  to  worship  and  understand — by  whom  they  are 
too  often  crushed.  You  have  been  degraded,  but  you  have 
purified  yourself  in  the  fires  of  repentance,  and  you  now  are 
great ;  I  feel  myself  too  small  to  be  your  equal,  and  I  am  too 
religious  to  humble  myself  to  any  power  but  that  of  the  Most 
High.  Your  life,  my  friend,  may  thus  be  stated ;  we  are  in 
the  North,  among  the  clouds,  where  abstractions  are  familiar 
to  our  minds." 

"Seraphita,  you  kill  me  when  you  talk  so,"  he  replied. 
"It  is  always  torture  to  me  to  see  you  thus  apply  the  monstrous 
science  which  strips  all  human  things  of  the  properties  they 
derive  from  time,  space,  form,  when  you  regard  them  mathe- 
matically under  some  ultimate  simplest  expression,  as  geometry 
does  with  bodies,  abstracting  dimensions  from  substance." 

"Well,  Wilfrid,  I  submit.  Look  at  this  bearskin  rug 
which  my  poor  David  has  spread.  What  do  you  think  of 
it?" 

"I  like  it  very  well." 

"You  did  not  know  I  had  that  Doucha greka ? " 

It  was  a  sort  of  pelisse  made  of  cashmere  lined  with  black 
fox-skin;  the  name  means,  "warm  to  the  soul." 

"Do  you  suppose/'  said  she,  "that  any  sovereign  in  any 
court  possesses  a  fur  wrap  to  match  it  ?  " 

"  It  is  worthy  of  her  who  wears  it  ?  " 

"And  whom  you  think  very  beautiful?" 

"Human  words  are  inapplicable  to  her;  she  must  bead- 
dressed  heart  to  heart." 

"  Wilfrid,  it  is  kind  of  you  to  soothe  my  griefs  with  such 
sweet  words — which  you  have  spoken  to  others." 

"Good-by." 

"  Stay.  I  love  you  truly,  and  Minna  too,  believe  me,  but 
to  me  you  two  are  one  being.  Thus  combined  you  are  as  a 
brother,  or,  if  you  will,  a  sister  to  me.  Marry  each  other,  let 
me  see  you  happy  before  quitting  forever  this  sphere  of  trial 


SERAPHITA.  29 

and  sorrow.  Dear  me  !  the  most  ordinary  women  have  made 
their  lovers  obey  their  will.  They  have  said  '  Be  silent ! ' 
and  their  lovers  were  mute.  They  have  said  '  Die  ! '  and  men 
have  died.  They  have  said  '  Love  me  from  afar  !  '  the  lovers 
have  remained  at  a  distance  like  courtiers  in  the  presence  of  a 
king.  They  have  said  '  Go,  marry ! '  and  the  men  have 
married.  Now,  I  want  you  to  be  happy,  and  you  refuse. 
Have  I  then  no  power  ?  Well,  Wilfrid — come  close  to  me. 
Yes,  I  should  be  sorry  to  see  you  married  to  Minna;  but 
when  you  see  me  no  more,  then — promise  me  to  make  her 
your  wife,  heaven  intends  you  for  each  other." 

"I  have  heard  you  with  rapture,  Seraphita.  Incomprehen- 
sible as  your  words  are,  they  are  like  a  charm.  But  what, 
indeed,  do  you  mean?" 

"To  be  sure ;  I  forget  to  be  foolish,  to  be  the  poor  creature 
in  whose  weakness  you  delight.  I  torture  you,  and  you  came 
to  this  wild  country  to  find  rest — you  who  are  racked  by  the 
fierce  throes  of  misunderstood  genius,  worn  out  by  the  patient 
labors  of  science,  who  have  almost  stained  your  hands  by 
crime,  and  worn  the  chains  of  human  justice." 

Wilfrid  had  fallen  half-dead  on  the  floor.  Seraphita  breathed 
on  the  young  man's  brow,  and  he  fell  calmly  asleep,  lying  at 
her  feet. 

"Sleep,  rest,"  said  she,  rising. 

After  laying  her  hands  on  Wilfrid's  forehead,  the  following 
phrases  fell  from  her  lips,  one  by  one,  each  in  a  different  tone, 
but  alike  melodious  and  full  of  a  kindly  spirit  that  seemed  to 
emanate  from  her  countenance  in  misty  undulations  like  the 
light  shed  by  the  heathen  goddess  on  the  beloved  shepherd  in 
his  sleep. 

"I  may  show  myself  to  you,  dear  Wilfrid,  as  I  am,  to  you 
who  are  strong. 

"  The  hour  is  come,  the  hour  when  the  shining  lights  of  the 
future  cast  their  reflections  on  the  soul,  the  hour  when  the 
soul  moves,  feeling  itself  free. 


30  SERAPHITA. 

"It  is  granted  to  me  now  to  tell  you  how  well  I  love  you. 
Do  you  not  see  what  my  love  is,  a  love  devoid  of  self-interest, 
a  feeling  full  of  you  alone,  a  love  which  follows  you  into  the 
future,  to  light  up  your  future,  for  such  love  is  the  true  light. 
Do  you  now  perceive  how  ardently  I  long  to  see  you  released 
from  the  life  that  is  a  burden  to  you,  and  nearer  to  the  world 
where  love  rules  forever?  Is  not  love  for  a  life-time  only 
sheer  suffering?  Have  you  not  felt  a  longing  for  eternal 
love  ?  Do  you  not  understand  to  what  ecstasy  a  being  can 
rise  when  he  is  double  through  loving  Him  who  never  betrays 
his  love,  Him  before  whom  all  bow  and  worship  ? 

"  I  would  I  had  wings,  Wilfrid,  to  cover  you  withal ;  I 
would  I  had  strength  to  give  you  that  you  might  know  the 
foretaste  of  the  world  where  the  purest  joys  of  the  purest 
union  known  on  earth  would  cast  a  shadow  in  the  light  that 
there  perennially  enlightens  and  rejoices  all  hearts  ! 

"  Forgive  a  friendly  soul  for  having  shown  you  in  one  word 
a  vision  of  your  faults  with  the  charitable  intention  of  lulling 
the  acute  torments  of  your  remorse.  Listen  to  the  choir  of 
forgiveness  !  Refresh  your  spirit  by  inhaling  the  dawn  that 
shall  rise  for  you  beyond  the  gloom  of  death  !  Yes,  for  your 
life  lies  there. 

"  My  words  shall  wear  for  you  the  glorious  garb  of  dreams, 
and  appear  as  forms  of  flame  descending  to  visit  you.  Rise  ! 
Rise  to  the  heights  whence  men  see  each  other  truly,  though 
tiny  and  crowded  as  the  sands  of  the  seashore.  Humanity  is 
unrolled  before  you  as  a  ribbon  :  look  at  the  endless  hues  of 
that  flower  of  the  gardens  of  heaven.  Do  you  see  those  who 
lack  intelligence,  those  who  are  beginning  to  be  tinged  by  it, 
those  who  have  been  tried,  those  who  are  in  the  circle  of  love, 
and  those  in  wisdom,  who  aspire  to  celestial  illumination  ? 

"  Do  you  understand,  through  these  thoughts  made  visible, 
the  destination  of  man — whence  he  comes,  whither  he  is 
tending  ?  Keep  on  your  road.  When  you  shall  have  reached 
your  journey's  end,  you  will  hear  the  trumpet  call  of  omnipo- 


SERAPHITA.  31 

tence  and  loud  shouts  of  victory,  and  harmonies,  only  one  of 
which  would  shake  the  earth,  but  which  are  lost  in  a  world 
where  there  is  neither  East  nor  West. 

"  Do  you  perceive,  dear,  much-tried  one,  that  but  for  the 
torpor  and  the  veil  of  sleep,  such  visions  would  rend  and 
carry  away  your  intellect,  as  the  wind  of  a  tempest  rends  and 
sweeps  away  a  light  sail,  and  would  rob  a  man  for  ever  of  his 
reason  ?  Do  you  perceive  that  the  soul  alone,  raised  to  its 
highest  power,  and  even  in  a  dream,  can  scarce  endure  the 
consuming  effluence  of  the  Spirit  ? 

"  Fly,  fly  again  through  the  realms  of  light  and  glory,  ad- 
mire, hurry  on.  As  you  fly  you  are  resting,  you  go  forward 
without  fatigue.  Like  all  men,  you  would  fain  dwell  always 
thus  bathed  in  these  floods  of  fragrance  and  light,  where  you 
are  wandering  free  of  your  unconscious  body,  speaking  in 
thought  only.  Hurry,  fly,  rejoice  for  a  moment  in  the  wings 
you  will  have  earned  when  love  is  so  perfect  in  you  that  you 
shall  cease  to  have  any  senses,  that  you  shall  be  all  intellect 
and  all  love  !  The  higher  you  soar,  the  less  can  you  conceive 
of  the  gulf  beneath.  Now,  gaze  at  me  for  a  moment,  for  you 
will  henceforth  see  me  but  darkly,  as  you  behold  me  by  the 
light  of  the  dull  sun  of  the  earth  !  " 

Seraphita  stole  up  with  her  head  gently  bent  on  one  side, 
her  hair  flowing  about  her  in  the  airy  pose  which  the  sublimest 
painters  have  attributed  to  messengers  from  heaven ;  the  folds 
of  her  dress  had  the  indescribable  grace  which  makes  the 
artist,  the  man  to  whom  everything  is  an  expression  of  feeling, 
stop  to  gaze  at  the  exquisite  flowing  veil  of  the  antique  statue 
of  Polyhymnia. 

Then  she  extended  her  hand  and  Wilfrid  rose. 

When  he  looked  at  Seraphita,  the  fair  girl  was  lying  on  the 
bearskin,  her  head  resting  on  her  hand,  her  face  calm,  her 
eyes  shining.  Wilfrid  gazed  at  her  in  silence,  but  his  features 
expressed  respectful  awe,  and  he  looked  at  her  timidly. 

"  Yes,  dear  one,"  said  he  at  last,  as  if  answering  a  question, 


32  SERAPHITA. 

"  whole  worlds  divide  us  !  I  submit ;  I  can  only  adore  you. 
But  what  is  to  become  of  me  thus  lonely?" 

"  Wilfrid,  have  you  not  your  Minna?  " 

He  hung  his  head. 

"Oh,  do  not  be  so  scornful!  a  woman  can  understand 
everything  by  love.  When  she  fails  to  understand,  she  feels ; 
when  she  cannot  feel,  she  sees ;  when  she  can  neither  see,  nor 
feel,  nor  understand — well,  that  angel  of  earth  divines  your 
need,  to  protect  you  and  to  hide  her  protection,  under  the 
grace  of  love." 

"  Seraphita,  am  I  worthy  to  love  a  woman?  " 

"You  are  suddenly  grown  very  modest !  Is  this  a  snare? 
A  woman  is  always  so  much  touched  to  find  her  weakness 
glorified!  Well,  the  evening  after  to-morrow,  come  to  tea. 
You  will  find  our  good  Pastor  Becker,  and  you  will  see  Minna, 
the  most  guileless  creature  I  ever  knew  in  this  world.  Now 
leave  me,  my  friend ;  I  must  say  long  prayers  this  evening  in 
expiation  of  my  sins." 

"How  can  you  sin?" 

"  My  poor,  dear  friend,  is  not  the  abuse  of  power  the  sin 
of  pride?  I  have  been,  I  think,  too  arrogant  to-day.  Now 
away.  Till  to-morrow." 

"  Till  to-morrow !  "  Wilfrid  feebly  echoed,  with  a  long  look 
at  the  being  of  whom  he  desired  to  carry  away  an  indelible 
memory. 

Though  he  meant  to  leave,  he  remained  standing  for  some 
moments  outside,  looking  at  the  lights  that  beamed  from  the 
windows  of  the  Swedish  dwelling. 

"What  was  it  that  I  saw?"  he  asked  himself.  "No,  it 
was  not  a  single  being,  but  a  whole  creation.  I  retain,  of 
that  world  seen  through  veils  and  mists,  a  ringing  echo  like 
the  remembrance  of  departed  pain,  or  like  the  dizziness  caused 
by  dreams  in  which  we  hear  the  moaning  of  past  generations 
mingling  with  the  harmonious  voices  of  higher  spheres,  where 
all  is  light  and  love.  Am  I  awake?  Do  I  still  slumber? 


SERAPHITA.  33 

Have  I  not  yet  opened  my  sleeping  eyes,  those  eyes  before 
whose  sight  luminous  spaces  stretch  into  infinitude,  eyes  that 
can  discern  those  spaces?  In  spite  of  the  night  and  the  cold, 
my  head  is  still  on  fire.  I  will  go  to  the  manse.  Between  the 
pastor  and  his  daughter  I  may  recover  my  balance." 

But  he  did  not  yet  leave  the  spot  whence  he  could  see  into 
Seraphita's  sitting-room.  This  mysterious  being  seemed  to 
be  the  radiant  centre  of  a  circle  which  formed  an  atmosphere 
about  her  rarer  than  that  which  surrounds  others:  he  who 
came  within  it  found  himself  involved  in  a  vortex  of  light  and 
of  consuming  thoughts.  Wilfrid,  obliged  to  struggle  against 
this  inexplicable  force,  did  not  triumph  without  considerable 
effort ;  when  he  had  gotten  out  of  the  precincts  of  the  house, 
he  recovered  his  freedom  of  will,  walked  quickly  to  the  par- 
sonage, and  presently  found  himself  under  the  lofty  wooden 
porch  that  served  as  an  entrance  hall  to  Pastor  Becker's  house. 
He  pushed  open  the  first  door,  packed  with  birch  bark,  against 
which  the  snow  had  drifted;  and  knocked  eagerly  at  the  inner 
door,  saying — 

"Will  you  allow  me  to  spend  the  evening  with  you,  Mon- 
sieur Becker?" 

"Yes,"  was  the  answer  in  two  voices  speaking  as  one. 

On  entering  the  parlor,  Wilfrid  was  gradually  brought  back 
to  real  life.  He  bowed  very  cordially  to  Minna,  shook  hands 
with  the  minister,  and  then  looked  about  him  on  a  scene 
which  soothed  the  excitement  of  his  physical  nature,  in  which 
a  process  was  going  on  resembling  that  which  sometimes  takes 
place  in  men  accustomed  to  long  contemplation.  When  some 
powerful  conception  carries  away  a  man  of  science  or  a  poet 
on  its  chimera-like  wings,  and  isolates  him  from  the  external 
surroundings  that  hedge  him  in  on  earth,  soaring  with  him 
through  those  boundless  regions  where  vast  masses  of  fact 
appear  as  abstractions  and  the  most  stupendous  works  of 
nature  seem  but  images,  woe  to  him  if  some  sudden  noise 
rouses  his  senses  and  recalls  his  wandering  soul  to  its  prison 
3 


34  SERAPHITA. 

of  bone  and  flesh  !  The  collision  of  the  two  powers :  body 
and  spirit,  one  of  which  has  something  of  the  invisible  element 
of  lightning;  while  the  other,  like  all  tangible  forms,  has  a 
certain  soft  resistancy  which  for  the  moment  defies  destruction 
— this  collision,  or,  to  be  accurate,  this  terrible  reunion,  gives 
rise  to  unspeakable  suffering.  The  body  has  cried  out  for  the 
fire  that  consumes  it,  and  the  flame  has  recaptured  its  prey. 
But  this  fusion  cannot  take  place  without  the  ebullition,  the 
crepitation  and  convulsions,  of  which  chemistry  affords  visible 
examples  when  two  hostile  elements  are  sundered  that  have 
been  joined  by  its  act. 

For  some  days  past,  whenever  Wilfrid  went  to  Seraphita's 
house,  his  body  there  fell  into  an  abyss.  By  a  single  look 
this  wonderful  creature  translated  him  in  the  spirit  to  the 
sphere  whither  meditation  carries  the  learned,  whither  prayer 
transports  the  pious  soul,  whither  his  eye  can  carry  the  artist, 
and  sleep  can  waft  some  dreamers ;  for  each  there  is  a  call 
bidding  him  to  that  empyrean  void,  for  each  a  guide  to  lead 
him  there — for  all  there  is  anguish  in  the  return.  There 
alone  is  the  veil  rent,  there  alone  is  Revelation  seen  without 
disguise — an  ardent  and  awful  disclosure  of  the  unknown 
sphere  of  which  the  soul  brings  back  nought  but  fragments. 
To  Wilfrid,  an  hour  spent  with  Seraphita  was  often  like  the 
dream  so  dear  to  the  opium-eater,  in  which  each  nerve-fibre 
becomes  the  focus  of  radiating  rapture.  He  came  away 
exhausted,  like  a  girl  who  should  try  to  keep  up  with  the  pace 
of  a  giant. 

The  sharp,  punishing  cold  began  to  subdue  the  agony  of 
trepidation  caused  by  the  re-amalgamation  of  the  two  elements 
in  his  nature  thus  violently  wrenched  asunder — one  shock  of 
which  partakes  of  the  unseen  qualities  of  a  thunderbolt, 
while  the  other  shares  with  sentient  nature  that  soft  resist- 
ant force  which  defies  destruction — then  he  always  made  his 
way  to  the  manse,  attracted  to  Minna  by  his  thirst  for  the 
scenes  of  homely  life,  as  a  European  traveler  thirsts  for  his 


SERAPHITA.  35 

native  land  when  home-sickness  seizes  him  in  the  midst  of  the 
fairy  splendors  that  tempted  him  to  the  East. 

At  this  moment  the  visitor,  more  exhausted  than  he  had 
ever  been  before,  dropped  into  a  chair  and  looked  about  him 
for  some  minutes,  like  a  man  aroused  from  sleep.  Pastor 
Becker  and  his  daughter,  accustomed  no  doubt  to  their  guest's 
eccentricity,  went  on  with  their  occupations. 

The  room  was  decorated  with  a  collection  of  Norwegian 
insects  and  shells.  These  curiosities,  ingeniously  arranged  on 
the  background  of  yellow  pinewood  with  which  the  wall  was 
wainscoted,  formed  a  colored  ornamentation  to  which  tobacco 
smoke  had  imparted  a  sombre  tone.  At  the  farther  end,  oppo- 
site the  door,  was  an  enormous  wrought-iron  stove,  carefully 
rubbed  by  the  neat  maidservant  till  it  shone  brightly  like  pol- 
ished steel. 

Pastor  Becker  was  seated  in  a  large  armchair,  covered  with 
worsted  work,  near  the  stove  and  in  front  of  a  table,  his  feet 
in  a  foot-muff,  while  he  read  from  a  folio  supported  on  other 
books  to  form  a  sort  of  desk.  On  his  right  stood  a  beer-pitcher 
and  a  glass ;  on  his  left  a  smoky  lamp  fed  with  fish  oil.  The 
minister  was  a  man  of  about  sixty  years;  his  face  of  the  type 
so  often  painted  by  Rembrandt :  the  small,  keen  eyes  set  in 
circles  of  fine  wrinkles  under  thick  grizzled  brows ;  white,  hair 
falling  in  two  silky  locks  from  beneath  a  black  velvet  cap ;  a 
broad,  bald  forehead,  and  the  shape  of  face  which  a  heavy 
chin  made  almost  square,  and,  added  to  this,  the  self-possessed 
calm  that  betrays  to  the  observer  some  conscious  power — the 
sovereignty  conferred  by  wealth,  by  the  judicial  authority  of 
the  burgomaster,  by  the  conviction  of  Art,  or  the  stolid 
tenacity  of  happy  ignorance.  The  handsome  old  man,  whose 
substantial  build  revealed  sound  health,  was  wrapped  in  a 
dressing-gown  of  rough  cloth  with  no  ornament  but  the  bind- 
ing. He  gravely  held  a  long  meerschaum  pipe  in  his  mouth, 
blowing  off  the  tobacco  smoke  at  regular  intervals,  and  watch- 
ing its  fantastic  spirals  with  a  speculative  eye,  while  endeavor- 


36  SERAPHITA. 

ing,  no  doubt,  to  assimilate  and  digest  by  meditation  the  ideas 
of  the  author  whose  work  he  was  studying. 

On  the  other  side  of  the  stove,  near  the  door  that  led  into 
the  kitchen,  Minna  was  dimly  visible  through  the  fog  of 
smoke,  to  which  she  seemed  to  be  inured.  In  front  of  her, 
on  a  small  table,  were  the  various  implements  of  a  needle- 
woman ;  a  pile  of  towels  and  stockings  to  be  mended,  and  a 
lamp  like  that  which  shone  on  the  white  pages  of  the  book  in 
which  her  father  seemed  to  be  absorbed.  Her  fresh,  young 
face,  delicately  pure  in  outline,  harmonized  with  the  innocence 
that  shone  on  her  white  brow  and  in  her  bright  eyes.  She  sat 
forward  on  her  chair,  leaning  a  little  toward  the  light  to  see 
the  better,  unconsciously  showing  the  grace  of  her  figure.  She 
was  already  dressed  for  the  evening  in  a  white  calico  wrapper; 
a  plain,  cambric  cap,  with  no  ornament  but  its  frill,  covered 
her  hair.  Though  lost  in  some  secret  meditation,  she  counted 
without  mistake  the  threads  in  the  towel,  or  the  stitches  in  her 
stocking.  Thus  she  presented  the  most  complete  and  typical 
image  of  woman  born  to  earthly  duties,  whose  eye  might 
pierce  the  clouds  of  the  sanctuary,  while  a  mind  at  once 
humble  and  charitable  kept  her  on  the  level  of  man.  Wil- 
frid, from  his  armchair  between  the  two  tables,  contemplated 
the  harmonious  picture  with  a  sort  of  rapture ;  the  clouds  of 
smoke  were  not  out  of  keeping. 

The  single  window  which  gave  light  to  the  room  in  the 
summer  was  now  carefully  closed.  For  a  curtain,  an  old 
piece  of  tapestry  hung  from  a  rod  in  heavy  folds.  There  was 
no  attempt  at  the  picturesque  or  showy — austere  simplicity, 
genuine  homeliness,  the  unpretentiousness  of  nature,  all  the 
habits  of  domestic  life  free  from  troubles  and  anxieties. 
Many  dwellings  leave  the  impression  of  a  dream  ;  the  daz- 
zling flash  of  transient  pleasure  seems  to  hide  a  ruin  under  the 
chill  smile  of  luxury ;  but  this  parlor  was  sublimely  real,  har- 
monious in  color,  and  apt  to  suggest  patriarchal  ideas  of  a 
busy  and  devout  life. 


SERAPHITA.  37 

The  silence  was  broken  only  by  the  heavy  step  of  the  maid 
preparing  the  supper,  and  by  the  singing  in  the  pan  of  the 
dried  fish  she  was  frying  in  salt  butter,  after  the  fashion  of 
the  country. 

"  Will  you  smoke  a  pipe  ?  "  said  the  pastor  presently,  when 
he  thought  that  Wilfrid  would  heed  him. 

"  No,  thank  you,  dear  Pastor  Becker,"  he  replied. 

"You  seem  less  well  than  usual  this  evening,"  said  Minna, 
struck  by  the  visitor's  weak  voice. 

"  I  am  always  so  when  I  have  been  to  the  castle." 

Minna  was  startled. 

"A  strange  creature  dwells  there,  Pastor  Becker,"  he  went 
on  after  a  pause.  "  I  have  been  six  months  in  the  village, 
and  have  never  dared  to  question  you  about  her ;  and  to-night 
I  have  to  do  violence  to  my  feelings  even  to  speak  of  her. 
At  first  I  greatly  regretted  to  find  my  travels  interrupted  by 
the  winter,  and  to  be  obliged  to  remain  here ;  for  the  last  two 
months,  however,  the  chains  binding  me  to  Jarvis  have  been 
more  closely  riveted,  and  I  fear  I  may  end  my  days  here. 
You  know  how  I  first  met  Seraphita,  and  the  impression  made 
on  me  by  her  eyes  and  her  voice,  and  how  at  last  I  was  admitted 
to  visit  her,  though  she  receives  nobody.  On  the  very  first 
day  I  came  to  you  for  information  concerning  that  mysterious 
creature.  Then  began  for  me  the  series  of  strange  enchant- 
ments  " 

"  Of  enchantments?  "  exclaimed  the  pastor,  shaking  out 
the  ashes  of  his  pipe  into  a  coarse  pan  of  sand  that  served 
him  as  a  spittoon.  "Are  enchantments  possible?  " 

"You,  certainly,  who  at  this  very  moment  are  so  con- 
scientiously studying  Jean  Wier's  book  of  Incantations,  will 
understand  the  account  I  can  give  you  of  my  sensations," 
Wilfrid  replied  quickly.  "  If  we  study  nature  attentively, 
alike  in  its  great  revolutions  and  in  its  minutest  works,  it  is 
impossible  not  to  admit  the  possibility  of  enchantment — 
giving  the  word  its  fullest  meaning.  Man  can  create  no 


38  SERAPHITA. 

force;  he  can  but  use  the  only  existing  force,  which  includes 
all  others,  namely,  Motion — the  incomprehensible  breath  of 
the  sovereign  Maker  of  the  universe.  The  elements  are  too 
completely  separated  for  the  hand  of  man  to  combine  them ; 
the  only  miracle  he  can  work  consists  in  the  mingling  of  two 
hostile  substances.  Even  so,  gunpowder  is  akin  to  thunder ! 

"As  to  effecting  an  act  of  creation,  and  that  suddenly  !  All 
creation  needs  time,  and  time  will  neither  hurry  nor  turn  back- 
ward at  our  bidding.  Hence,  outside  us,  plastic  nature  obeys 
laws  whose  order  and  procedure  cannot  be  reversed  by  any 
human  effort. 

"  But  after  conceding  this  to  mere  matter,  it  would  be  un- 
reasonable to  deny  the  existence,  within  us,  of  a  vast  power, 
of  which  the  effects  are  so  infinitely  various  that  the  known 
generations  of  men  have  not  yet  completely  classified  them. 
I  will  say  nothing  of  man's  faculty  of  abstracting  his  mind,  of 
comprehending  nature  in  the  limits  of  speech,  a  stupendous 
fact,  of  which  common  minds  think  no  more  than  they  think 
out  the  act  of  motion,  but  which  led  Indian  Theosophists  to 
speak  of  creation  by  the  Word,  to  which  they  also  attributed 
the  contrary  power.  The  tiniest  item  of  their  daily  food — a 
grain  of  rice,  whence  proceeds  a  whole  creature,  which 
presently  results  in  a  grain  of  rice  again — afforded  them  so 
complete  a  symbol  of  the  creative  Word  and  the  synthetical 
Word,  that  it  seemed  a  simple  matter  to  apply  the  system  to 
the  creation  of  worlds. 

"  Most  men  would  do  well  to  be  content  with  the  grain  of 
rice  that  lies  at  the  origin  of  every  genesis.  Saint  John,  when 
he  said  that  the  Word  was  God,  only  complicated  the  diffi- 
culty. 

"  But  the  fruition,  the  germination,  and  the  blossoming  of 
our  ideas  is  but  a  trifle  if  we  compare  this  property,  which  is 
distributed  among  so  many  men,  with  the  wholly  personal 
faculty  of  communicating  to  it  certain  more  or  less  efficient 
forces  by  means  of  concentration,  and  thus  raising  it  to  the 


SERAPH1TA.  39 

third,  ninth,  or  twenty-seventh  power,  giving  it  a  hold  on 
masses,  and  obtaining  magical  results  by  concentrating  the 
action  of  Nature.  What  I  call  enchantments  are  the  stupen- 
dous dramas  played  out  between  two  membranes  on  the  canvas 
of  the  brain.  In  the  unexplored  realms  of  the  spiritual  world 
we  meet  with  certain  beings  armed  with  these  astounding 
faculties — comparable  only  to  the  terrible  powers  of  gases  in 
the  physical  world — beings  who  can  combine  with  other 
beings,  can  enter  into  them  as  an  active  cause,  and  work 
magic  in  them,  against  which  their  hapless  victims  are  defense- 
less ;  they  cast  a  spell  on  them,  override  them,  reduce  them  to 
wretched  serfdom,  and  crush  them  with  the  weight  and  mag- 
nificent sway  of  a  superior  nature ;  acting,  now  like  the  gynv 
notus  which  electrifies  and  numbs  the  fisherman  ;  now,  again, 
like  a  dose  of  phosphorus  which  intensifies  the  sense  of  life  or 
hastens  its  projection ;  sometimes  like  opium,  which  lulls  cor- 
poreal nature,  frees  the  spirit  from  its  bondage,  sends  it  soaring 
above  the  world,  shows  it  the  universe  through  a  prism,  and 
extracts  for  it  the  nourishment  that  best  pleases  it ;  and  some- 
times like  catalepsy,  which  annuls  every  faculty  to  enhance  a 
single  vision. 

"  Miracles,  spells,  incantations,  witchcrafts,  in  short  all  the 
facts  that  are  incorrectly  called  supernatural,  can  only  be  pos- 
sible and  accounted  for  by  the  authority  with  which  some 
other  mind  compels  us  to  accept  the  effects  of  a  mysterious 
law  of  optics  which  magnifies,  or  diminishes,  or  exalts  crea- 
tion, enables  it  to  move  within  us  independently  of  our  will, 
distorts  or  embellishes  it,  snatches  us  up  to  heaven,  or  plunges 
us  into  hell — the  two  terms  by  which  we  express  the  excess  of 
rapture  or  of  pain.  These  phenomena  are  within  us,  not  out- 
side us. 

"The  being  we  call  Seraphita  seems  to  me  to  be  one  of 
those  rare  and  awe-inspiring  spirits  to  whom  it  is  given  to  con- 
strain men,  to  coerce  nature,  and  share  the  occult  powers  of 
God.  The  course  of  her  enchantments  on  me  began  by  her 


40  SERAPHITA. 

compelling  me  to  silence.  Every  time  I  dared  wish  to  ques- 
tion you  about  her,  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  was  about  to  reveal 
a  secret  of  which  I  was  bound  to  be  the  impeccable  guardian ; 
whenever  I  was  about  to  speak,  a  burning  seal  was  set  on  my 
lips,  and  I  was  the  involuntary  slave  of  this  mysterious  prohi- 
bition. You  see  me  now,  for  the  hundredth  time,  crushed, 
broken,  by  having  played  with  the  world  of  hallucinations 
that  dwells  in  that  young  thing,  to  you  so  gentle  and  frail,  to 
me  the  most  ruthless  magician.  Yes — to  me  she  is  a  sorceress 
who  bears  in  her  right  hand  an  invisible  instrument  to  stir  the 
world  with,  and  in  her  left  the  thunderbolt  that  dissolves 
everything  at  her  command.  In  short,  I  can  no  longer  behold 
her  face;  it  is  unendurably  dazzling. 

"I  have  for  the  last  few  days  been  wandering  round  this 
abyss  of  madness,  too  helplessly  to  keep  silence  any  longer. 
I  have,  therefore,  seized  a  moment  when  I  find  courage  enough 
to  resist  the  monster  that  drags  me  to  her  presence  without 
asking  whether  I  have  strength  enough  to  keep  up  with  his 
flight.  Who  is  she?  Did  you  know  her  as  a  child?  Was 
she  ever  born?  Had  she  parents?  Was  she  conceived  by 
the  union  of  sun  and  ice  ?  She  freezes  and  she  burns ;  she 
comes  forth  and  then  vanishes  like  some  coy  truth ;  she  at- 
tracts and  repels  me  ;  she  alternately  kills  and  vivifies  me  ;  I 
love  her  and  I  hate  her !  I  cannot  live  thus.  I  must  be  either 
in  heaven  altogether  or  in  hell." 

Pastor  Becker,  his  refilled  pipe  in  one  hand  and  in  the  other 
the  cover  which  he  had  forgotten  to  replace,  listened  to  Wilfrid 
with  a  mysterious  expression,  glancing  occasionally  at  his 
daughter,  who  seemed  to  understand  this  speech,  in  harmony 
with  the  being  it  referred  to.  Wilfrid  was  as  splendid  as 
Hamlet  struggling  against  his  father's  ghost,  to  whom  he 
speaks  when  it  rises  visible  to  him  alone  amid  the  living. 

"This  is  very  much  the  tone  of  a  man  in  love,"  said  the 
good  man  simply. 

"In  love!"  cried  Wilfrid;  "yes,  to  ordinary  apprehen- 


SERAPHITA.  41 

sions ;  but,  my  dear  Monsieur  Becker,  no  words  can  describe 
the  frenzy  with  which  I  rush  to  meet  this  wild  creature." 

"Then  you  do  love  her?"  said  Minna  reproachfully. 

"  Mademoiselle,  I  endure  such  strange  agitation  when  I  see 
her,  and  such  deep  dejection  when  I  see  her  not,  that  in  any 
other  man  they  would  be  symptoms  of  love  ;  but  love  draws 
two  beings  ardently  together,  while  between  her  and  me  a 
mysterious  gulf  constantly  yawns,  which  chills  me  through 
when  I  am  in  her  presence,  but  of  which  I  cease  to  be 
conscious  when  we  are  apart.  I  leave  her  each  time  in 
greater  despair ;  I  return  each  time  with  greater  ardor,  like  a 
scientific  inquirer  seeking  for  Nature's  secrets  and  for  ever 
baffled  ;  like  a  painter  who  yearns  to  give  life  to  his  canvas, 
and  wrecks  himself  and  every  resource  of  art  in  the  futile 
attempt." 

"Yes,  that  strikes  me  as  very  true,"  said  the  girl. 

"  How  should  you  know,  Minna?  "  asked  the  old  man. 

"Ah  !  father,  if  you  had  been  with  us  this  morning  to  the 
summit  of  the  Falberg,  and  had  seen  her  praying,  you  would 
not  ask  me.  You  would  say,  as  Wilfrid  did  the  first  time 
he  saw  her  in  our  place  of  worship :  'It  is  the  Spirit  of 
Prayer!'  " 

A  few  moments  of  silence  ensued. 

"It  is  true  !  "  cried  Wilfrid.  "  She  has  nothing  in  common 
with  the  creatures  who  writhe  in  the  pits  of  this  world." 

"  On  the  Falberg  !  "  the  old  pastor  exclaimed.  "  How  did 
you  manage  to  get  there?" 

"  I  do  not  know,"  said  Minna.  "The  expedition  is  now 
like  a  dream  to  me  of  which  only  the  remembrance  survives. 
I  should  not  believe  in  it,  perhaps,  but  for  this  substantial 
proof." 

She  drew  the  flower  from  her  bosom  and  showed  it  to  him. 
They  all  three  fixed  their  eyes  on  the  pretty  saxifrage,  still  quite 
fresh,  which,  under  the  gleam  of  the  lamps,  shone  amid  the 
clouds  of  smoke  like  another  light. 


42  SERAPHITA. 

"This  is  supernatural,"  said  the  old  man,  seeing  a  flower 
in  bloom  in  the  winter. 

"A  mystery  !  "  cried  Wilfrid,  fevered  by  the  perfume. 

"The  flower  fills  me  with  rapture,"  said  Minna.  "I 
fancy  I  can  still  hear  his  speech,  which  is  the  music  of  the 
mind,  as  I  still  see  the  light  of  his  gaze,  which  is  love." 

"  Let  me  entreat  you,  my  dear  Pastor  Becker,  to  relate  the 
life  of  Seraphita — that  enigmatical  flower  of  humanity  whose 
image  I  see  in  this  mysterious  blossom." 

"My  dear  guest,"  said  the  minister,  blowing  a  puff  of 
tobacco-smoke,  "to  explain  the  birth  of  this  being,  it  will 
be  necessary  to  disentangle  for  you  the  obscurest  of  all  Chris- 
tian creeds  ;  but  it  is  not  easy  to  be  clear  when  discussing  the 
most  incomprehensible  of  all  revelations,  the  latest  flame  of 
faith,  they  say,  that  has  blazed  on  our  ball  of  clay.  Do  you 
know  anything  of  Swedenborg?" 

"  Nothing  but  his  name.  Of  himself,  his  writings,  his 
religion,  I  am  wholly  ignorant." 

"  Well,  then,  I  will  tell  you  all  about  Swedenborg." 


III. 

SERAPHITA — SERAPHITUS. 

After  a  pause,  during  which  the  pastor  seemed  to  be  collect- 
ing his  thoughts,  he  went  on  as  follows: 

"  Emanuel  von  Swedenborg  was  born  at  Upsala,  in  Sweden, 
in  the  month  of  January,  1688,  as  some  authors  say,  or,  accord- 
ing to  his  epitaph,  in  1689.  His  father  was  bishop  of  Skara. 
Swedenborg  lived  to  the  age  of  eight-five,  and  died  in  London 
on  the  29th  March,  1772.  I  use  the  word  'died'  to  express 
a  change  of  condition  only.  According  to  his  disciples, 
Swedenborg  has  been  at  Jarvis  and  in  Paris  since  that  time. 
Permit  me,  my  dear  Wilfrid,"  said  the  pastor,  with  a  gesture 
to  check  interruption,  "  I  am  relating  the  tale  without  affirming 
or  denying  the  facts.  Listen,  and  when  I  have  done  you  can 
think  what  you  choose.  I  will  warn  you  when  I  myself 
judge,  criticise,  or  dispute  the  doctrines,  so  as  to  show  my 
intellectual  neutrality  between  reason  and  the  man  himself. 

"Emanuel  Swedenborg's  life  was  divided  into  two  distinct 
phases,"  Becker  went  on.  "From  1688  till  1745  Baron 
Emanuel  von  Swedenborg  was  known  in  the  world  as  a  man 
of  vast  learning,  esteemed  and  beloved  for  his  virtues,  always 
blameless,  and  invariably  helpful.  While  filling  important 
public  posts  in  Sweden,  he  published,  between  1709  and  1740, 
several  important  books  on  mineralogy,  physics,  mathematics, 
and  astronomy,  which  were  of  value  in  the  scientific  world. 
He  invented  a  method  of  constructing  docks  to  receive 
vessels ;  he  treated  many  very  important  questions,  from  the 
height  of  the  flood-tide  to  the  position  of  the  earth  in  space. 
He  discovered  the  way  to  construct  more  efficient  locks  on 
canals,  as  well  as  simpler  methods  for  the  smelting  of  metals. 
In  short,  he  never  took  up  a  science  without  advancing  it. 

(43) 


44  SERAPHITA. 

"  In  his  youth  he  studied  Hebrew,  Greek,  Latin,  and  the 
Oriental  languages,  and  became  so  familiar  with  these  tongues 
that  several  celebrated  professors  constantly  consulted  him,  and 
he  was  enabled  to  discover  in  Tartary  some  traces  of  the  earliest 
book  of  God's  Word,  called  the  '  Book  of  the  Wars  of  Jeho- 
vah,' and  of  the  Judgments  mentioned  by  Moses  (Numbers 
xxi.  14,  15),  by  Joshua,  Jeremiah,  and  Samuel.  The  wars  of 
the  Lord  are  said  to  be  the  historical  portion,  and  the  Judg- 
ments the  prophetic  portion,  of  this  book,  written  prior  to 
Genesis.  Swedenborg  even  asserted  that  the  Book  of  Jasher, 
or  of  the  Upright,  mentioned  by  Joshua,  existed  in  Eastern 
Tartary  with  the  worship  by  Correspondences.  A  French- 
man, I  have  been  told,  has  recently  confirmed  Swedenborg's 
anticipations  by  announcing  the  discovery  at  Bagdad  of  sev- 
eral parts  of  the  Bible  unknown  in  Europe. 

"In  1785,  on  the  occasion  of  the  discussion  on  animal 
magnetism*  started  in  Paris,  and  raised  almost  throughout 
Europe,  in  which  most  men  of  science  took  an  eager  part, 
Monsieur  de  Thome  defended  Swedenborg's  memory  in  a 
reply  to  the  assertions  so  rashly  made  by  the  commissioners 
appointed  by  the  King  of  France  to  inquire  into  this  subject. 
These  gentlemen  stated  that  there  was  no  theory  accounting 
for  the  action  of  the  lodestone,  whereas  Swedenborg  had  made 
it  his  study  so  early  as  in  1720.  Monsieur  de  Thome  took 
the  opportunity  to  point  out  the  reasons  for  the  neglect  in 
which  the  most  celebrated  savants  had  left  the  name  of  the 
learned  Swede,  so  as  to  be  free  to  plunder  his  volumes  and 
use  his  treasures  in  their  own  works.  '  Some  of  the  most 
illustrious,'  said  Monsieur  de  Thome,  alluding  to  Buffon's 
'  Theory  of  the  Earth,'  '  are  mean  enough  to  dress  in  the  pea- 
cock's plumage  without  giving  him  the  credit.'  Finally,  by 
several  convincing  quotations  from  Swedenborg's  encyclo- 
paedic writings,  he  proved  that  this  great  prophet  had  out- 
stripped by  many  centuries  the  slow  progress  of  human  learn- 
*  Friedrich  Anton  Mesmer  was  the  founder,  hence  Mesmerism. 


SERAPHITA,  45 

ing ;  and,  indeed,  to  read  his  works  is  enough  to  carry  con- 
viction on  this  point. 

"  In  one  passage  he  is  the  precursor  of  the  present  system 
of  chemistry,  announcing  that  the  products  of  organic  nature 
can  all  be  decomposed  and  resolved  into  two  pure  elements ; 
that  water,  air,  and  fire  are  not  elements ;  in  another  he  goes 
in  a  few  words  to  the  heart  of  magnetic  mystery,  and  thus 
anticipates  Mesmer.  In  short,"  said  the  minister,  pointing 
to  a  long  shelf  between  the  stove  and  the  window,  on  which 
were  books  of  various  sizes,  "  there  are  seventeen  works  by 
him;  one  of  them,  published  in  1734,  'Studies  in  Philoso- 
phy and  Mineralogy,'  consists  of  three  folio  volumes.  These 
books,  which  bear  witness  to  Swedenborg's  practical  knowl- 
edge, were  given  to  me  by  Baron  Seraphitus,  his  cousin,  and 
Seraphita's  father. 

"In  1740,  Swedenborg  sank  into  complete  silence,  never 
relaxing  it  except  to  renounce  temporal  studies  and  to  think 
exclusively  of  the  spiritual  world. 

"He  received  his  first  commands  from  heaven  in  1745. 
This  is  how  he  relates  his  call — 

"  '  One  evening,  in  London,  after  he  had  dined,  eating 
heartily,  a  thick  mist  filled  the  room.  When  the  darkness 
cleared  away,  a  being  that  had  assumed  a  human  form  rose 
up  in  a  corner  of  the  room  and  said  in  a  terrible  voice,  "  Do 
not  eat  so  much."  He  then  fasted  completely.  Next  even- 
ing the  same  man  was  visible,  radiant  with  light,  and  said  to 
him — 

" '  "  I  am  sent  by  God,  who  has  chosen  thee  to  set  forth 
to  men  the  meaning  of  His  word  and  His  creation.  I  will 
dictate  what  thou  shall  write." 

"  The  vision  lasted  but  a  few  minutes.  The  angel,  he  said, 
was  clad  in  purple. 

"  During  that  night  the  eyes  of  his  inner  man  were  opened 
and  enabled  to  see  into  the  heavens,  into  the  world  of  spirits, 
and  into  hell,  three  different  circles,  where  he  met  persons  he 


46  SERAPHITA. 

had  known  who  had  perished  from  their  human  state,  some 
long  ago,  and  some  quite  recently.  From  that  time  Sweden- 
borg  always  lived  the  spiritual  life,  and  remained  in  this 
world  as  a  being  sent  from  God. 

"Though  his  mission  was  disputed  by  the  incredulous,  his 
conduct  was  visibly  that  of  a  being  superior  to  human  weak- 
ness. In  the  first  instance,  though  limited  by  his  means  to 
the  strictest  necessaries,  he  gave  away  immense  sums,  and  was 
known  to  be  the  means  of  restoring,  in  various  commercial 
towns,  some  great  houses  of  business  that  had  failed,  or  were 
failing.  No  one  who  appealed  to  his  generosity  went  away 
without  being  helped  on  the  spot.  An  incredulous  English- 
man, going  in  search  of  him,  met  him  in  Paris,  and  he  has 
recorded  that  Swedenborg's  doors  were  always  left  open. 
One  day  his  servant  complained  of  this  apparent  neglect, 
which  exposed  him  to  suspicion  if  his  master  should  be 
robbed. 

"  '  Let  him  make  his  mind  easy,'  said  Swedenborg,  smiling; 
'  I  forgive  him  want  of  faith ;  he  cannot  see  the  guardian  who 
keeps  watch  before  my  door.' 

"And,  in  fact,  in  whatever  country  he  might  be  living,  his 
doors  were  never  shut,  and  he  never  lost  anything. 

"  When  he  was  at  Gothenburg,  a  town  sixty  miles  from 
Stockholm,  three  days  before  the  news  arrived  of  the  great 
fire  that  raged  at  Stockholm,  he  had  announced  the  hour  at 
which  it  had  begun,  adding  that  his  house  was  unharmed — 
which  was  true.* 

"  The  Queen  of  Sweden,  when  at  Berlin,  told  the  King,  her 
brother,  that  one  of  her  ladies  being  summoned  to  repay  a 
sum  of  money  which  she  knew  that  her  husband  had  returned 
before  his  death,  being  unable  to  find  the  receipt,  had  gone  to 
Swedenborg  and  begged  him  to  inquire  of  her  husband  where 
the  proof  of  payment  could  be.  On  the  following  day 
Swedenborg  told  her  the  place  where  the  receipt  was ;  then, 
*  Kant,  who  was  skeptical,  admits  this  as  proven. 


SERAPHITA.  47 

in  accordance  with  the  lady's  desire,  he  called  upon  the  dead 
man  to  appear  to  his  wife,  and  she  saw  her  husband,  in  a 
dream,  in  the  dressing-gown  he  had  worn  before  his  death, 
and  he  showed  her  the  document  in  the  place  mentioned  by 
Swedenborg,  where  in  fact  it  lay  hidden. 

"  One  day,  on  sailing  from  London  in  the  ship  of  a  Captain 
Dixon,  he  heard  a  lady  asking  if  there  were  a  good  stock  of 
provisions  on  board. 

"  '  You  will  not  need  a  very  large  quantity,'  said  he.  '  In 
a  week,  at  two  o'clock,  we  shall  be  in  the  port  of  Stockholm,' 
and  so  it  was. 

"  The  state  of  second-sight,  into  which  Swedenborg  could 
pass  at  will  in  relation  to  earthly  things,  astonishing  as  it  was 
to  all  who  knew  him,  by  its  marvelous  results,  was  no  more 
than  a  weaker  development  of  his  power  of  seeing  into  the 
skies. 

"  Of  all  his  visions,  those  in  which  he  traveled  to  the  astral 
worlds  are  not  the  least  curious,  and  his  descriptions  are  no 
doubt  surprisingly  artless  in  their  details.  A  man  whose  great 
scientific  acquirements  are  beyond  question,  who  combined  in 
his  brain  conception,  will,  and  imagination,  would  certainly 
have  invented  something  better  if  he  had  invented  at  all. 
Nor  does  the  fantastic  literature  of  the  East  contain  anything 
that  can  have  suggested  the  idea  of  this  bewildering  narrative 
full  of  poetic  germs,  if  we  may  compare  a  work  of  faith  to 
the  writings  of  Arabian  fancy. 

"The  account  of  his  being  snatched  up  by  the  angel  who 
guided  him  in  his  first  voyage  is  sublime  to  a  degree  as  far 
beyond  the  poems  of  Klopstock,  Milton,  Tasso,  and  Dante, 
as  the  earth,  by  God's  will,  is  from  the  sun.  This  chapter, 
which  forms  the  introduction  to  his  '  Treatise  on  the  Astral 
Worlds,'  has  never  been  published  ;  it  remains  among  the  oral 
traditions  left  by  Swedenborg  to  the  three  disciples  who  were 
dearest  to  him.  Monsieur  Silverichm  has  it  in  writing.  Baron 
Seraphitus  sometimes  tried  to  tell  me  of  it ;  but  his  memory 


48  SERAPHITA. 

of  his  cousin  was  so  vivid  that  he  stopped  after  a  few  words, 
and  fell  into  a  reverie  from  which  nothing  could  rouse  him. 

"  The  discourse  in  which  the  angel  proved  to  Swedenborg 
that  those  planets  are  not  created  to  wander  uninhabited, 
crushes  all  human  science,  the  baron  assured  me,  under  the 
grandeur  of  its  divine  logic. 

"According  to  the  Seer,  the  inhabitants  of  Jupiter  do  not 
affect  the  sciences,  which  they  call  Shades ;  those  of  Mercury 
object  to  the  expression  of  ideas  by  words,  which  they  think 
too  material,  and  they  have  a  language  of  the  eye ;  those  of 
Saturn  are  persistently  tormented  by  evil  spirits;  those  of  the 
Moon  are  as  small  as  children  of  six  years  old,  their  voice 
proceeds  from  the  stomach,  and  they  creep  about ;  those  of 
Venus  are  of  gigantic  stature,  but  very  stupid,  and  live  by 
robbery ;  part  of  that  planet,  however,  is  inhabited  by  beings 
of  great  gentleness,  who  live  loving  to  do  good.  Finally, 
he  describes  the  customs  of  the  people  who  dwell  on  those 
globes,  and  gives  an  account  of  the  general  purpose  of  their 
existence  as  part  of  the  universe  in  terms  so  precise,  adding 
explanations  which  agree  so  well  with  the  effects  of  their  ap- 
parent motion  in  the  system  of  the  universe,  that  some  day, 
perhaps,  scientific  men  will  drink  of  these  luminous  waters. 
Here,"  said  the  pastor,  taking  down  the  volume  and  opening 
it  at  a  page  where  a  marker  was  placed,  '•'  these  are  the  words 
which  conclude  this  great  work :  '  If  any  one  should  doubt 
my  having  been  transported  to  so  many  astral  regions,  let  him 
remember  my  remarks  as  to  distances  in  the  other  life.  They 
exist  only  in  relation  to  the  external  form  of  man ;  now  I, 
having  been  inwardly  constituted  like  the  angelic  spirits  of 
those  globes,  have  been  enabled  to  know  them.' 

"The  circumstances  to  which  we  owed  the  residence  in 
this  district  of  Baron  Seraphitus,  Swedenborg's  dearly  loved 
cousin,  made  me  intimately  familiar  with  every  fact  of  the 
life  of  that  extraordinary  man. 

"  Not  long  since  he  was  accused  of  imposture  in  some 


SERAPHITA.  49 

European  newspapers,  which  reported  the  following  facts  as 
related  in  a  letter  from  the  Chevalier  Beylon.  Swedenborg, 
'  informed,'  it  was  said,  '  by  some  senators  of  a  secret  corre- 
pondence  between  the  late  Queen  of  Sweden  and  her  brother, 
the  Prince  of  Prussia,  revealed  the  contents  to  that  princess, 
leaving  her  to  believe  that  he  had  acquired  the  information 
by  supernatural  means.  A  man  of  the  highest  credit,  Mon- 
sieur Charles-Leonard  von  Stahlhammer,  captain  of  the  King's 
Guard  and  Knight  of  the  Sword,  refuted  this  calumny  in  a 
letter.'" 

The  pastor  hunted  through  some  papers  in  his  table-drawer, 
found  a  newspaper,  and  handed  it  to  Wilfrid,  who  read  aloud 
the  following  letter : 

"STOCKHOLM,  May  13,  1788. 

"I  have  read  with  astonishment  the  letter  reporting  the 
interview  between  the  famous  Swedenborg  and  Queen  Louisa- 
Ulrica.  All  the  circumstances  are  falsified;  and  I  hope  the 
writer  will  pardon  me  if  I  show  him  how  greatly  he  is  mis- 
taken, by  giving  here  an  exact  account,  of  which  the  truth  can 
be  attested  by  several  personages  of  distinction  who  were 
present,  and  who  are  still  living. 

"In  1758,  not  long  after  the  Prince  of  Prussia's  death, 
Swedenborg  came  to  court ;  he  was  in  the  habit  of  doing  so 
very  regularly.  No  sooner  did  the  Queen  see  him  than  she 
asked,  '  By  the  way,  Baron  Assessor,  have  you  seen  my 
brother  ? '  Swedenborg  said  he  had  not,  and  the  Queen  re- 
plied, '  If  you  should  see  him,  greet  him  from  me.' 

"She  had  no  idea  in  saying  this  but  of  a  jest;  it  did  not 
occur  to  her  to  ask  for  any  information  concerning  her  brother. 

"A  week  later — not  twenty-four  days,  nor  for  a  private 
audience — Swedenborg  came  again,  but  so  early  that  the 
Queen  had  not  yet  left  her  own  apartment,  known  as  the 
White  Room,  where  she  was  chatting  with  her  ladies  of  honor 
and  other  ladies  about  the  court.  Swedenborg  did  not  wait 
for  the  Queen  to  come  out.  He  went  into  her  private  room 
4 


60  SERAPHITA. 

and  spoke  in  her  ear.  The  Queen,  quite  astounded,  turned 
faint,  and  it  took  some  time  to  revive  her.  When  she  had 
recovered  herself,  she  said  to  those  about  her,  '  God  alone  and 
my  brother  could  know  what  he  has  just  told  me  ! '  And  she 
said  he  had  spoken  of  her  last  correspondence  with  the  prince, 
of  which  the  subject  had  been  known  to  themselves  only. 

"I  cannot  explain  how  Swedenborg  gained  his  knowledge 
of  this  secret ;  but  what  I  can  aver  on  my  honor  is  that  neither 

Count  H ,  as  the  author  of  the  letter  states,  nor  any  one 

else,  had  intercepted  or  read  the  Queen's  letters.  The  Senate 
had  at  that  time  allowed  her  to  write  to  her  brother  in  the 
strictest  confidence,  regarding  the  correspondence  as  a  matter 
perfectly  indifferent  to  the  State.  It  is  evident  that  the  writer 

of  that  letter  knew  nothing  of  Count  H 's  character. 

That  distinguished  gentleman,  who  did  his  country  important 
service,  combines  with  intellectual  talent  fine  qualities  of  the 
heart,  and  his  advanced  years  have  not  deteriorated  his  noble 
gifts.  Throughout  his  official  career  he  has  been  equally  re- 
markable for  enlightened  political  views  and  the  most  scrupu- 
lous integrity,  and  he  was  always  the  declared  enemy  of  secret 
intrigues  and  covert  devices,  which  he  regarded  as  the  basest 
means  to  any  end. 

"  Nor  did  the  writer  know  Swedenborg  the  Assessor ;  the 
only  weak  point  in  this  thoroughly  honest  man  was  his  belief 
in  apparitions  and  spirits ;  but  I  knew  him  for  a  long  time,  and 
I  can  positively  state  that  he  was  as  well  assured  that  he  cer- 
tainly did  talk  and  mingle  with  spirits  as  I  am  at  this  moment 
of  writing  these  lines.  As  a  citizen  and  as  a  friend,  he  was  a 
man  of  absolute  integrity,  with  a  horror  of  imposture,  and  he 
led  an  exemplary  life. 

"  Hence  the  account  given  of  the  incident  by  the  Chevalier 
de  Beylon  is  without  foundation  ;  and  the  visit  said  to  have 

been  paid  to  Swedenborg,  at  night,  by  Counts  H and 

T is  a  pure  invention. 

"  The  writer  of  the  letter  may  rest  assured  that  I  am  any- 


SERAPH  IT  A.  51 

thing  rather  than  a  follower  of  Swedenborg ;  nothing  but  the 
love  of  truth  has  moved  me  to  relate  with  accuracy  a  fact  that 
has  often  been  told  with  details  that  are  incorrect;  and  I  affirm 
what  I  have  here  written  to  be  the  truth,  and  sign  it  with  my 
name." 

"The  proofs  of  his  mission  given  by  Swedenborg  to  the 
families  of  Prussia  and  Sweden  no  doubt  formed  a  basis  for  the 
belief  he  inspired  in  several  personages  of  the  two  courts,"  the 
pastor  went  on,  replacing  the  newspaper  in  his  drawer.  "At 
the  same  time,  I  cannot  tell  you  all  the  facts  of  his  material 
and  visible  life;  his  habits  precluded  their  beingexactly  known. 
He  lived  in  strict  retirement,  never  trying  to  grow  rich  or  to 
rise  to  fame.  He  was  even  remarkable  for  a  sort  of  repug- 
nance to  proselytizing ;  he  spoke  freely  to  very  few  persons, 
and  never  communicated  those  gifts  but  to  those  who  were 
conspicuous  for  faith,  wisdom,  and  love.  He  could  read  at  a 
glance  the  frame  of  mind  in  which  each  one  approached  him, 
and  could  make  seers  of  those  whom  he  desired  to  touch  with 
his  inward  Word. 

"After  the  year  1745  his  disciples  never  saw  him  do  a  single 
thing  from  a  merely  human  motive. 

"One  man  only,  a  Swedish  priest  named  Matthesius,  ac- 
cused him  of  madness.  By  a  singular  coincidence  this  Mat- 
thesius, the  enemy  of  Swedenborg  and  his  writings,  went  mad 
not  long  after,  and  was  living  a  few  years  since  at  Stockholm 
on  a  pension  allowed  him  by  the  King  of  Sweden. 

"A  discourse  in  honor  of  Swedenborg  was  composed  with 
great  care  as  to  the  details  of  his  life,  and  read  at  a  general 
meeting  in  the  hall  of  the  Royal  Academy  of  Sciences  at 
Stockholm,  by  Monsieur  de  Sandel,  councilor  to  the  College 
of  Mines,  in  1786.  Finally,  a  deposition  laid  before  the  Lord 
Mayor  of  London  testifies  to  the  smallest  circumstances  of 
Swedenborg's  last  illness  and  death  under  the  ministrations 
of  Pastor  Ferelius,  a  Swedish  ecclesiastic  of  the  highest  respect- 


52  SERAPHITA. 

ability.  The  persons  attesting  declared  that,  far  from  recant- 
ing, Swedenborg  always  averred  the  truth  of  his  writings. 

"  '  In  a  hundred  years'  time,'  said  he,  '  my  doctrines  will 
govern  the  church.' 

"  He  foretold  precisely  the  day  and  hour  of  his  death.  On 
that  day,  Sunday,  March  29,  1772,  he  asked  what  o'clock  it 
was. 

"  '  Five  o'clock,'  was  the  answer. 

"  'It  is  all  over,'  said  he.     '  God  bless  you  ! ' 

"And  ten  minutes  after  he  died  quite  calmly  with  a  gentle 
sigh.  Thus  moderation,  simplicity,  and  solitude  were  the 
features  of  his  life. 

"  Whenever  he  had  finished  writing  a  treatise,  he  took  ship 
to  have  it  printed  in  London  or  in  Holland,  and  never  talked 
about  it.  He  thus  published  twenty-seven  works  in  all, 
written,  as  he  declared,  at  the  dictation  of  angels.  Whether 
or  not  this  be  true,  few  men  are  capable  of  enduring  this 
flaming  language. 

"Here  they  all  are,"  said  the  minister,  pointing  to  an 
upper  shelf  on  which  stood  about  sixty  volumes.  "The 
seven  books  on  which  the  Spirit  of  God  had  shed  its  brightest 
lights  are :  '  The  Delights  of  Wisdom  in  Conjugal  Love ; ' 
'  Heaven  and  Hell ; '  '  The  Apocalypse  Explained ; '  '  An  Ex- 
position of  the  Inward  Sense  ; '  '  On  the  Divine  Love ; '  '  The 
True  Christian  Religion ;  '  '  The  Angelic  Wisdom  of  the 
Omnipotence,  Omniscience,  and  Omnipresence  of  those  who 
share  the  Eternity  and  Immensity  of  God.' 

"  His  explanation  of  the  Apocalypse  begins  with  these 
words,"  said  the  pastor,  opening  the  volume  that  was  lying 
near  him  :  "  '  Herein  I  have  written  nothing  of  my  own  ;  I 
have  spoken  at  the  bidding  of  the  Lord,  who  said  to  John,  by 
the  same  angel,  "  Thou  shall  not  seal  the  words  of  this 
prophecy."  ' 

"  My  dear  sir,"  the  good  man  went  on,  looking  at  Wilfrid, 
"  many  a  winter  night  have  I  quaked  in  every  limb  while  read- 


SERAPHITA.  53 

ing  the  tremendous  works  in  which  this  man  sets  forth  the 
greatest  marvels  in  perfect  good  faith. 

"  '  I  have  seen,'  says  he,  '  the  heavens  and  the  angels.  The 
spiritual  man  sees  spiritual  man  far  more  clearly  than  the 
earthly  man  sees  earthly  man.  I  obey  the  command  of  the 
Lord  who  hath  given  it  to  me  to  do.  Men  are  free  not  to 
believe  me ;  I  cannot  put  others  into  the  state  into  which 
God  hath  put  me.  It  is  not  in  my  power  to  make  them 
hold  conversation  with  the  angels,  nor  to  work  a  miracle 
in  predisposing  their  understanding ;  they  themselves  must 
be  the  agents  of  their  angelical  exaltation.  For  twenty-eight 
years  now  I  have  dwelt  in  the  spiritual  world  with  the 
angels,  and  yet  on  earth  with  men ;  for  it  hath  pleased  the 
Lord  to  open  the  eyes  of  my  spirit  as  he  opened  the  eyes  of 
Paul,  of  Daniel,  and  of  Elisha.' 

"  Certain  persons,  however,  have  had  visions  of  the  spiritual 
world  through  the  complete  severance  of  their  external  body 
and  their  inner  man  by  somnambulism.  In  that  state,  Swe- 
denborg  tells  us  in  his  treatise  on  'Angelic  Wisdom,'  man 
may  be  raised  to  celestial  light,  because,  the  physical  senses 
being  in  abeyance,  heavenly  influences  act  on  the  inner  man 
without  interference. 

"A  good  many  persons  who  do  not  doubt  that  Sweden- 
borg  had  celestial  revelations,  still  do  not  regard  all  his  writ- 
ings as  equally  stamped  with  Divine  inspiration.  Others  insist 
on  a  complete  acceptance  of  Swedenborg,  while  confessing 
his  obscurities;  but  they  think  that  it  was  the  imperfection  of 
earthly  language  that  hindered  the  prophet  in  expressing  his 
spiritual  visions,  so  that  such  obscurities  disappear  before  the 
eyes  of  those  who  are  regenerate  by  faith ;  to  use  a  striking 
expression  of  his  favorite  disciple's,  *  the  flesh  is  begotten 
externally.' 

"  To  poets  and  writers  he  is  infinitely  marvelous  ;  to  seers 
it  is  all  absolute  truth.  His  descriptions  have  been  a  matter  of 
scandal  to  some  Christians;  critics  have  laughed  at  the 


54  SERAPHITA. 

'  celestial  substance '  of  his  temples,  his  golden  palaces,  his 
magnificent  mansions  where  angels  flutter  and  play ;  others 
have  ridiculed  his  groves  of  mystical  trees,  and  gardens  where 
flowers  have  speech,  where  the  air  is  white,  and  mystical 
gems — sardonyx,  carbuncle,  chrysolite,  chrysoprase,  cyanite, 
chalcedony,  and  beryl,  the  Urim  and  Thummin — are  endowed 
with  motion,  express  celestial  truths,  and  may  be  questioned, 
since  they  reply  by  variations  of  light  ('  True  Religion,'  217, ' 
218).  Some  very  good  men  will  not  recognize  his  worlds 
where  colors  are  heard  in  delicious  concerts,  where  words  are 
flames,  and  the  Word  is  written  in  inflected  letters  ('  True 
Religion,'  278).  Even  in  the  North  some  writers  have  made 
fun  of  his  gates  of  pearl,  of  the  diamonds  with  which  the 
houses  of  his  New  Jerusalem  are  paved  and  furnished,  where 
the  humblest  utensils  are  made  of  the  rarest  materials. 

"'But,'  his  disciples  argue,  'though  such  substances  are 
sparsely  distributed  in  this  world,  is  that  any  reason  why  they 
should  not  be  abundant  in  another  ?  On  earth  they  are  but 
earthly,  while  in  heaven  they  are  seen  under  celestial  aspects 
in  relation  to  the  angelic  state.'  And  Swedenborg  would 
quote  on  such  points  the  great  words  of  Jesus  Christ,  '  If  I 
have  told  you  earthly  things,  and  ye  believe  not,  how  shall  ye 
believe,  if  I  tell  you  of  heavenly  things?'  (John  iii.  12.) 

"  I,  sir,  have  read  Swedenborg  from  beginning  to  end,"  the 
pastor  went  on,  with  an  emphatic  gesture.  "I  may  say  it 
with  pride,  since  I  have  preserved  my  reason.  As  you  read 
you  must  either  lose  your  wits  or  become  a  seer.  Though  I 
have  escaped  both  forms  of  madness,  I  have  often  felt  un- 
known raptures,  deep  amazement,  inward  joy  such  as  can  only 
come  of  the  fullness  of  truth,  the  evidence  of  heavenly  illumi- 
nation. Everything  here  below  shrinks,  dwindles,  as  the 
soul  studies  the  burning  pages  of  those  writings.  It  is  im- 
possible not  to  be  struck  with  astonishment  on  reflecting  that 
within  the  space  of  thirty  years  this  man  published  twenty-five 
quarto  volumes  on  the  truths  of  the  spirtual  world,  written  in 


SERAPHITA.  55 

Latin,  the  shortest  containing  five  hundred  pages,  and  all  in 
small  print.  He  left  twenty  more,  it  is  said,  in  London,  in 
the  care  of  his  nephew,  Monsieur  Silverichm,  formerly  chap- 
lain to  the  King  of  Sweden.  Certainly  the  man  who,  between 
twenty  and  sixty,  spent  himself  in  publishing  a  sort  of  ency- 
clopaedia, must  have  had  supernatural  help  to  enable  him  to 
compose  these  prodigious  treatises,  at  an  age  when  the  powers 
of  man  are  beginning  to  fail. 

"  In  these  works  there  are  thousands  of  propositions,  all 
numbered,  none  of  them  contradictory.  Method,  preciseness, 
and  a  collected  mind  are  everywhere  conspicuous,  all  based  on 
the  one  fact  of  the  existence  of  angels.  His  'True  Religion,' 
in  which  his  whole  dogma  is  summed  up,  is  a  work  of  power- 
ful lucidity,  and  was  conceived  and  carried  out  when  he  was 
eighty-three  years  of  age.  His  ubiquity,  his  omniscience, 
have  indeed  never  been  disproved  by  his  critics  or  his  enemies. 

"  Nevertheless,  even  when  I  was  soaked,  so  to  speak,  in  this 
torrent  of  celestial  illumination,  God  did  not  open  my  inward 
eye ;  I  judged  of  these  writings  by  the  reason  of  an  unregen- 
erate  man.  I  have  often  been  of  opinion  that  Swedenborg, 
the  inspired,  must  have  misunderstood  the  angels.  I  laughed 
at  many  visions,  which,  according  to  the  seers,  I  ought  rever- 
ently to  believe  in.  I  could  not,  for  instance,  appreciate  the 
spiral  writing  of  the  angels,  nor  their  belts  of  thicker  or  thinner 
gold.  Though  the  statement,  'There  are  solitary  angels/  at 
first  struck  me  as  singularly  pathetic,  I  could  not  reconcile 
this  loneliness  with  their  manner  of  marriage.  I  did  not  see 
why  the  Virgin  Mary  should  wear  white  satin  robes  in  heaven. 
I  dared  question  why  the  giant  demons  Enakim  and  Hephilim 
came  again  and  again  to  fight  with  the  Cherubim  on  the  Apoc- 
alyptic plains  of  Armageddon.  I  fail  to  see  how  the  Satanic 
and  heavenly  angels  can  still  hold  discussions.  Baron  Sera- 
phitus  replied  to  me  that  these  details  referred  to  the  angels 
who  are  yet  on  earth  in  human  form. 

"The  visions  of  the  Swedish  prophet  are  often  disfigured 


56  SERAPHITA. 

by  grotesque  touches.  One  of  his  '  Memorabilia ' — the  name 
he  gives  them — begins  with  these  words :  '  I  saw  the  spirits 
met  together,  and  they  had  hats  on  their  heads.'  In  another 
of  these  Memorable  relations  he  received  from  heaven  a  small 
paper  on  which,  he  says,  he  saw  the  letters  used  by  primitive 
races,  composed  of  curved  lines  with  little  rings  curling  up- 
ward. For  clearer  proof  of  this  communication  from  heaven 
I  should  have  liked  him  to  deposit  this  document  with  the 
Royal  Academy  of  Sciences  at  Stockholm. 

"After  all,  I  may  be  wrong;  the  material  absurdities  that 
are  scattered  throughout  his  works  have  spiritual  meanings 
perhaps.  Otherwise,  how  can  we  account  for  the  growing  in- 
fluence of  his  doctrine  ?  His  followers  now  number  more 
than  seven  hundred  thousand  souls,  partly  in  the  United 
States  of  America,  where  many  sects  have  joined  them  in  a 
body,  and  partly  in  England,  where  there  are  seven  thousand 
Swedenborgians  in  the  city  of  Manchester  alone.  Men  no  less 
distinguished  by  their  learning  than  by  their  worldly  rank — 
some  in  Germany  and  some  in  Prussia  and  the  North — have 
publicly  adopted  Swedenborg's  beliefs,  which  indeed  are  more 
consolatory  than  those  of  all  other  Christian  communions. 

"  I  should  now  like  to  expound  to  you  in  a  few  short  words 
the  capital  points  of  the  doctrines  set  forth  by  Swedenborg  to 
his  church  ;  but  such  an  abridgement,  from  memory,  would 
necessarily  be  defective.  I  can,  therefore,  only  enlarge  on 
the  arcana  connected  with  the  birth  of  Seraphita." 

Here  the  pastor  paused  while  meditating  apparently  to  col- 
lect his  reminiscences,  and  then  he  went  on — 

"  Having  proved  mathematically  that  man  shall  live  for 
ever  in  an  upper  or  a  lower  sphere,  Swedenborg  gives  the  title 
of  angelic  spirits  to  such  beings  as,  in  this  world,  are  prepared 
for  heaven,  where  they  become  angels.  According  to  him, 
God  did  not  create  angels  independently ;  there  are  none  but 
those  who  have  been  human  beings  on  earth.  Thus  the  earth 
is  the  nursery  ground  for  heaven.  The  angels  are  not  angels 


SERAPHITA.  57 

by  original  nature;  they  are  transformed  into  angels  by  an 
intimate  union  with  God  which  God  never  refuses,  the  very 
essence  of  God  being  never  negative,  but  always  active  ('  An- 
gelic Wisdom '). 

"Angelic  spirits,  then,  go  through  three  natures  of  love, 
for  man  can  only  be  regenerate  by  stages  ('  True  Religion '). 
First,  LOVE  OF  SELF:  the  supreme  expression  of  it  is  human 
genius,  of  which  the  works  are  worshiped.  Next,  LOVE  OF 
THE  WORLD  at  large,  which  produces  prophets  and  those  great 
men  whom  the  earth  accepts  as  guides  and  hails  as  divine. 
Finally,  LOVE  OF  HEAVEN,  which  forms  angelic  spirits.  These 
spirits  are,  so  to  speak,  the  flowers  of  humanity,  which  cul- 
minates, and  strives  to  be  epitomized,  in  them.  They  must 
have  either  the  love  or  the  wisdom  of  heaven  ;  but  they  must 
dwell  in  that  love  before  they  dwell  in  wisdom.  Thus  the 
first  transformation  of  man  is  to  love.  To  achieve  this  first 
grade,  in  his  previous  existences  he  must  have  gone  through 
hope  and  charity,  which  engender  in  him  the  gifts  of  faith 
and  prayer.  The  ideas  gained  by  the  exercise  of  these  virtues 
are  transmitted  to  each  new  human  embodiment  within  which 
the  metamorphoses  of  the  inner  man  are  hidden.  Nothing 
avails  separately ;  hope  is  inseparable  from  charity,  faith  from 
prayer;  the  four  faces  of  this  figure  are  equally  important. 
'  For  lack  of  one  virtue,'  says  he,  '  the  angelic  spirit  is  as 
a  flawed  pearl.'  Thus  each  existence  is  a  sphere  into  which 
are  absorbed  the  celestial  treasures  of  the  former  one.  The 
great  perfection  of  the  angelic  spirits  comes  of  this  mysterious 
progress,  by  which  nothing  is  lost  of  the  qualities  successively 
acquired  till  they  attain  to  their  most  glorious  incarnation ;  for, 
at  every  fresh  transformation,  they  unconsciously  lose  some- 
thing of  the  flesh  and  its  works. 

"When  he  lives  in  love  man  has  thrown  off  all  his  evil 
passions ;  hope,  charity,  faith,  and  prayer  have,  to  use  the 
word  of  Isaiah,  winnowed  his  inner  man,  which  can  never 
more  be  polluted  by  any  earthly  affection.  Hence  the  great 


68  SERAPHITA. 

lesson  in  Saint  Luke :  '  Lay  up  for  yourselves  treasures  in 
heaven  where  neither  moth  nor  rust  do  corrupt,'  and  the 
teaching  of  Jesus  Christ  that  we  should  leave  this  world  to 
men,  for  it  is  theirs,  and  purify  ourselves  and  go  to  our  Father 
in  heaven  who  is  perfect. 

"  The  second  transformation  is  to  wisdom.  Wisdom  is  that 
apprehension  of  heavenly  things  to  which  the  spirit  rises 
through  love.  The  spirit  of  love  has  triumphed  over  force ;  as 
a  result  of  having  conquered  every  earthly  passion,  he  loves 
God  blindly ;  but  the  spirit  of  wisdom  has  intelligence  and 
knowledge  of  why  he  loves.  The  wings  of  the  first  are  spread 
and  bear  him  up  to  God  ',  the  wings  of  the  second  are  folded 
in  awe  derived  from  knowledge  :  he  knows  God.  One  inces- 
santly desires  to  see  God  and  soars  up  to  Him;  the  other 
stands  near  Him  and  trembles. 

"The  union  of  a  spirit  of  love  with  a  spirit  of  wisdom  lifts 
the  creature  into  the  divine  state  in  which  the  soul  is  WOMAN 
and  the  body  MAN — the  final  expression  of  humanity,  in  which 
the  spirit  is  supreme  over  the  form,  and  the  form  still  con- 
tends with  the  divine  spirit ;  for  the  form,  which  is  the  flesh, 
is  ignorant  and  rebellious,  and  would  fain  remain  gross.  It  is 
this  supreme  conflict  which  gives  rise  to  the  inexpressible  an- 
guish which  the  heavens  alone  can  see — the  agony  of  Christ 
in  the  Garden  of  Olives.  After  death,  the  first  heaven  opens 
to  receive  this  purified  compound  human  nature.  Thus  men 
die  in  despair,  while  spirits  die  in  ecstasy.  Hence  the  natural 
state,  in  which  are  all  unregenerate  beings ;  the  spiritual  state, 
in  which  are  the  angelic  spirits  ;  and  the  divine  state,  in  which 
the  angel  dwells  before  bursting  its  husk,  are  the  three  degrees 
of  existence  by  which  man  attains  heaven. 

"A  sentence  of  Swedenborg's  will  admirably  explain  to  you 
the  difference  between  the  natural  and  the  spiritual  states : 
'  To  men,'  says  he,  '  the  natural  passes  into  the  spiritual ;  they 
regard  the  world  under  its  visible  forms,  and  perceive  it  in  a 
reality  adjusted  to  their  senses.  But  to  the  angelic  spirit  the 


SERAPH1TA.  59 

spiritual  passes  into  the  natural ;  he  'regards  the  world  in  its 
inmost  spirit,  not  under  its  outer  form.' 

"  Hence  our  human  sciences  are  but  the  analysis  of  form. 
The  learned  of  this  world  are  purely  superficial,  as  their 
knowledge  is ;  their  inner  man  is  of  no  avail  except  to  pre- 
serve an  aptitude  for  apprehension  and  truth.  The  angelic 
spirit  goes  far  beyond  this.  His  knowledge  is  the  thought  of 
which  human  science  is  the  mere  utterance  ;  he  derives  a 
knowledge  of  things  from  the  Word  by  studying  the  cor- 
respondences by  which  the  worlds  are  harmonized  with  the 
heavens.  The  Word  of  God  was  written  entirely  by  such  cor- 
respondences ;  it  contains  a  hidden  or  spiritual  meaning  which 
cannot  be  understood  without  the  study  of  correspondences. 
'There  are,'  says  Swedenborg  ('Celestial  Doctrine'),  'in- 
numerable arcana  in  the  inward  meaning  of  the  correspond- 
ences.' 

"  Those  men  who  have  laughed  to  scorn  the  books  in  which 
the  prophets  have  treasured  the  Word  were  in  such  a  state  of 
ignorance  as  men  are  in  who,  in  this  world,  knowing  nothing 
of  a  science,  mock  the  truths  of  that  science.  To  know  the 
correspondences  of  the  Word  with  heavenly  things,  to  know 
the  correspondences  that  exist  between  the  visible  and  ponder- 
able things  of  the  earthly  globe  and  invisible  and  imponderable 
things  of  the  spiritual  world,  is  to  '  have  the  heavens  in  your 
understanding.' 

"  Every  object  of  every  creation  proceeded  from  the  hand 
of  God,  and  has,  therefore,  necessarily  a  hidden  meaning,  as 
we  see  in  those  grand  words  of  Isaiah,  '  The  earth  is  as  a  gar- 
ment '  (Isaiah  li.  6).  This  mysterious  tie  between  the  smallest 
atoms  of  matter  and  the  heavens  constitutes  what  Swedenborg 
calls  a  Celestial  Arcanum.  Indeed,  his  treatise  on  the  '  Ce- 
lestial Arcana,  in  which  he  explains  the  correspondences  or 
symbolism  of  the  natural  and  spiritual,  containing,  as  Jacob 
Boehm  has  it,  the  'sign  and  seal  of  all  things,'  contains  no 
less  than  thirteen  thousand  propositions,  filling  sixteen  vol- 


60  SERAPHITA. 

umes.  'This  wonderful  apprehension  of  correspondences 
which  the  grace  of  God  vouchsafed  to  Swedenborg,'  says  one 
of  his  disciples,  '  is  the  secret  of  the  interest  taken  in  his 
works.'  According  to  this  commentator,  'everything  is  de- 
rived from  heaven,  everything  returns  to  heaven.  The  pro- 
phet's words  are  sublime  and  lucid ;  he  speaks  in  the  heavens, 
and  is  understood  on  earth.  A  volume  might  be  written  on 
any  one  of  his  phrases.'  And,  among  a  thousand  others,  he 
quotes  this  text :  '  The  realm  of  heaven,'  says  Swedenborg 
('Arcana  Celestia'),  'is  the  realm  of  impulsion.  Action  takes 
form  in  heaven,  and  thence  in  the  world,  and  by  degrees  in 
the  minutest  details  of  earthly  life ;  earthly  effects  being  thus 
continuous  with  heavenly  causes,  the  result  in  every  case  is 
correspondent  and  symbolical.  Man  is  the  link  of  union  be- 
tween the  Natural  and  the  Spiritual.' 

"  Angelic  spirits,  then,  inevitably  know  the  correspondences 
that  link  each  earthly  thing  to  heaven,  and  they  know  the  in- 
most sense  of  the  prophetic  words  which  foretell  their  evolu- 
tion. Thus,  to  these  spirits  everything  here  below  has  its 
hidden  meaning.  The  smallest  flower  is  a  thought,  a  life  an- 
swering to  some  feature  of  the  Great  Whole,  of  whom  they 
have  a  persistent  intuition.  To  them  the  adulteries  and  de- 
bauchery of  which  the  Scriptures  and  the  Prophets  speak,  and 
which  are  often  misapprehended  by  self-styled  scribes,  signify 
the  state  of  the  souls  who  in  this  world  persist  in  debasing 
themselves  with  earthly  affections,  and  so  confirm  their  divorce 
from  heaven.  Clouds  symbolize  the  veils  that  shroud  God. 
The  candlesticks,  the  shew-bread,  the  horses  and  riders,  the 
whores,  the  jewels — everything  in  the  Scriptures  has  for  them 
a  super-sensual  meaning,  and  reveals  the  future  of  earthly  his- 
tory in  its  relation  to  heaven.  They  can  all  enter  into  the 
truth  of  the  declarations  of  Saint  John,  which  human  science 
demonstrates,  and  substantially  proves  at  a  later  time,  such 
as  this,  'pregnant,'  says  Swedenborg,  'with  many  human 
sciences :  I  saw  a  new  heaven  and  a  new  earth,  for  the  first 


SERAPHITA.  61 

heaven  and  the  first  earth  were  passed  away'  (Rev.  xxi.  i). 
They  know  the  suppers  where  '  they  eat  the  flesh  of  kings,  and 
the  flesh  of  captives,  and  the  flesh  of  mighty  men,'  to  which 
[the  fowls]  are  bidden  by  an  angel  standing  in  the  sun  (Rev. 
xix.  17,  1 8).  They  see  the  woman  with  wings,  clothed  with 
the  sun,  and  the  man  always  armed.  '  The  horse  of  the 
Apocalypse,'  says  Swedenborg,  '  is  the  visible  image  of  the 
human  intellect  ridden  by  death,  because  it  bears  in  itself  the 
element  of  its  own  destruction.'  Finally,  they  recognize  the 
nations  hidden  under  forms  which,  to  the  ignorant,  seem 
grotesque. 

"  When  a  man  is  prepared  to  receive  the  prophetical  insuffla- 
tion of  correspondences,  the  Spirit  of  the  Word  moves  within 
him ;  he  then  sees  that  creations  are  but  transformations ;  it 
gives  vitality  to  his  intellect,  and  a  burning  thirst  for  truth 
which  can  only  be  quenched  in  heaven.  In  proportion  to  the 
greater  or  less  perfection  of  his  inner  man  he  can  conceive  of 
the  power  of  the  angelic  spirit ;  and  guided  by  desire,  the  least 
perfect  state  of  unregenerate  man,  he  proceeds  to  hope,  which 
opens  before  him  the  world  of  spirits,  and  thence  to  prayer, 
which  is  the  key  of  heaven. 

"  What  human  creature  could  fail  to  desire  to  become 
worthy  of  passing  into  the  sphere  of  those  intellects  that  live 
in  secret  by  love  or  wisdom?  During  their  life  on  earth  those 
spirits  remain  pure ;  they  neither  see,  nor  think,  nor  speak  as 
other  men  do. 

"  There  are  two  modes  of  perception — the  external  and  the 
internal.  Man  is  wholly  external ;  the  angelic  spirit  is  wholly 
internal.  The  spirit  penetrates  the  sense  of  numbers  ;  it 
masters  them  all  and  knows  their  meanings.  It  is  lord  of  mo- 
tion, and  is  one  with  everything  by  ubiquity:  'One  angel  is 
present  to  another  whenever  he  will,'  says  the  Swedish  Seer 
('Angelic  Wisdom  concerning  Divine  Love'),  for  he  has  the 
power  of  escaping  from  the  body,  and  sees  the  heavens  as  the 
prophets  saw  them,  and  as  Swedenborg  himself  saw  them. 


62  SERAPHITA. 

"'In  this  state,'  he  says,  in  the  'True  Religion,'  'the 
spirit  of  a  man  is  borne  from  one  place  to  another,  his  body 
remaining  where  it  is,  a  state  in  which  I  lived  for  twenty-six 
years. '  This  is  the  meaning  to  be  given  to  the  Bible  phrase, 
*  The  Spirit  carried  me.' 

"Angelic  wisdom  is  to  human  wisdom  what  the  numberless 
forces  of  Nature  are  to  its  action,  which  is  single.  Every- 
thing lives  again,  moves,  and  exists  in  the  spirit,  for  it  is  in 
God,  as  it  is  expressed  in  these  words  of  Saint  Paul,  In  Deo 
sumus,  movemur  et  vivimus  (In  God  we  live  and  move  and 
have  our  being,  Acts  xvii.  28).  Earth  offers  no  obstacle  to  it, 
as  the  Word  offers  no  difficulties.  Its  nearness  to  the  divine 
state  enables  it  to  see  the  thought  of  God  veiled  by  the  Word, 
just  as  the  spirit  dwelling  inwardly  can  communicate  with  the 
hidden  meaning  of  all  the  things  of  this  world.  Science  is  the 
language  of  the  temporal  world ;  love  is  that  of  the  spiritual 
world.  Man,  indeed,  describes  more  than  he  explains;  while 
the  angelic  spirit  sees  and  understands.  Science  saddens 
man  ;  love  enraptures  the  angel ;  science  is  still  seeking,  love 
has  found.  Man  judges  of  Nature  in  relation  to  itself;  the 
angelic  spirit  judges  of  it  in  relation  to  heaven.  In  short,  to 
the  spirits  everything  speaks. 

"  The  spirits  are  in  the  secret  of  the  reciprocal  harmony  of 
creations ;  they  are  in  accord  with  the  spirit  of  sounds,  with 
the  spirit  of  colors,  with  the  spirit  of  vegetable  life ;  they  can 
question  minerals,  and  minerals  reply  to  their  thoughts. 
What,  to  them,  are  the  learning  and  the  treasures  of  earth 
when  they  can  constantly  command  them  by  their  sight,  and 
when  the  worlds  of  which  men  think  so  much  are  for  the 
spirits  no  more  than  the  topmost  step  whence  they  will  fly  up 
to  God  ?  Heavenly  love  and  heavenly  wisdom  are  visibly  with 
them,  seen  by  the  elect  in  a  halo  of  light  that  envelops  them. 
Their  innocence,  of  which  a  child's  innocence  is  the  external 
image,  has  knowledge  which  children  have  not ;  they  are 
innocent,  and  they  know. 


SERAPHITA.  63 

"'And,'  says  Swedenborg,  'the  innocence  of  heaven 
makes  so  deep  an  impression  on  the  soul,  that  those  who 
enjoy  it  feel  a  rapture  which  goes  with  them  all  through  life, 
as  I  myself  have  experienced.  It  is  enough,  perhaps,'  he 
says  elsewhere,  '  to  have  the  smallest  inkling  of  it  to  trans- 
form one  for  ever,  and,  by  desiring  to  go  to  heaven,  to  enter 
into  the  sphere  of  hope.' 

"  His  doctrine  of  marriage  may  be  summed  up  in  a  few 
words : 

"  '  The  Lord  took  the  beauty  and  grace  of  man's  life  and 
infused  them  into  woman.  When  man  is  disunited  from  this 
beauty  and  elegance  of  life,  he  is  austere,  sad,  or  savage ; 
when  he  is  reunited  to  them,  he  is  happy,  he  is  complete.' 

"  The  angels  are  for  ever  in  the  perfection  of  beauty.  Their 
marriages  take  place  with  miraculous  ceremonies.  To  such 
union,  from  which  no  children  are  born,  man  brings  Under- 
standing, woman  brings  Will ;  they  become  one  being — one 
flesh  on  earth  ;  then,  after  putting  on  the  heavenly  body,  they 
go  to  heaven.  On  earth,  in  the  natural  state,  the  mutual 
attraction  of  the  two  sexes  leads  to  lust,  which  is  an  effect, 
producing  fatigue  and  disgust ;  but  in  their  heavenly  form, 
the  pair,  having  become  one  spirit,  finds  in  itself  a  cause  of 
perpetual  joys.  Swedenborg  had  seen  such  a  union  of  spirits, 
who,  as  Saint  Luke  has  written,  '  neither  marry  nor  are  given 
in  marriage,'  and  this  union  leads  to  none  but  spiritual  pleas- 
ures. An  angel  offered  to  take  him  to  witness  such  a  marriage, 
and  bore  him  away  on  his  wings ;  the  wings  are  only  sym- 
bolical, and  not  an  earthly  reality.  He  clothed  him  in  his 
festal  garment ;  and  Swedenborg,  seeing  himself  arrayed  in 
light,  asked  the  reason. 

"  '  On  such  occasions,'  replied  the  angel,  '  our  robes  light 
up  and  shine  and  are  nuptial  garments '  ('  The  Delight  of 
Wisdom  in  Conjugal  Love '). 

"  He  then  saw  two  angels  who  came — one  from  the  South 
and  the  other  from  the  East.  The  angel  from  the  South  rode 


64  SERAPHITA. 

in  a  chariot  drawn  by  two  white  horses,  whose  reins  were  of 
the  color  and  the  radiance  of  the  morning ;  but  when  they 
came  near  him  in  heaven,  he  saw  no  more  of  the  chariot  or 
horses.  The  angel  from  the  East,  clothed  in  purple,  and  the 
angel  from  the  South,  in  hyacinth  color,  rushed  together  like 
two  breaths  of  wind,  and  were  one  ;  one  was  an  angel  of  Love, 
and  the  other  an  angel  of  Wisdom.  Swedenborg's  guide  told 
him  that  on  earth  these  two  angels  had  been  bound  by  an 
inward  sympathy,  and  constantly  united,  though  divided  by 
space.  Consent,  which  is  the  essence  of  happy  marriage  on 
earth,  is  the  habitual  condition  of  angels  in  heaven.  Love  is 
the  light  of  their  world.  They  become  infinite  by  partici- 
pating of  the  essence  of  God,  who  generates  Himself  by  Him- 
self. 

"  The  perpetual  ecstasy  of  the  angefs  is  produced  by  the 
faculty,  bestowed  on  them  by  God,  of  giving  back  to  Him  the 
joy  they  have  in  Him.  This  reciprocity  of  the  infinite  con- 
stitutes their  life.  In  heaven  they,  too,  become  infinite  by 
partaking  of  the  essential  nature  of  God,  who  is  self-subsistent. 
Such  is  the  vastness  of  the  heavens  where  the  angels  dwell, 
that  if  man  were  endowed  with  vision  as  constantly  rapid  as 
the  transmission  of  light  from  the  sun  to  the  earth,  and  if  he 
gazed  through  all  eternity,  his  eyes  would  find  no  horizon  to 
rest  on.  Light  alone  can  be  an  emblem  of  the  joys  of  heaven. 
'It  is,'  says  he  ('Angelic  Wisdom'),  'an  effluence  of  the 
virtue  of  God,  a  pure  emanation  from  His  glory,  compared  to 
which  our  most  brilliant  day  is  dark.  It  is  omnipotent,  it 
renews  everything,  and  cannot  be  absorbed  ;  it  surrounds  the 
angel,  putting  him  into  contact  with  God  by  infinite  joys 
which  are  felt  to  multiply  and  reproduce  themselves  to  infinity. 
This  light  kills  the  man  who  is  not  prepared  to  receive  it.  No 
one  on  earth,  or  indeed  in  the  heavens,  can  look  on  God  and 
live.  This  is  why  it  is  written  (Exodus  xix.  12,  21-23),  'Set 

bounds  unto  the   people  round  about  [the  Mount] lest 

they   break   through and  many   of  them  perish.'     And 


SERAPHITA.  65 

again  (Exodus  xxxiv.  29-35),  'When  Moses  came  down  with 
the  two  Tables  of  Testimony,  the  skin  of  his  face  shone,  and 
Moses  put  a  veil  upon  his  face  till  he  had  done  speaking  with 
the  people.'  The  Transfiguration  of  Jesus  Christ  also  testifies 
to  the  light  shed  by  a  messenger  from  heaven  and  the  extreme 
joy  of  the  angels  in  being  for  ever  bathed  in  it.  '  His  face,' 
says  Saint  Matthew  (xvii.  2),  '  did  shine  as  the  sun,  and  His 
raiment  was  white  as  the  light and  a  bright  cloud  over- 
shadowed them.' 

"When  a  planet  is  inhabited  only  by  beings  who  reject  the 
Lord  and  misprize  His  Word,  when  the  angelic  spirits  have 
gathered  from  the  four  winds,  God  sends  a  destroying  angel 
to  alter  the  whole  mass  of  that  rebellious  world,  which,  in  the 
vast  spaces  of  the  universe,  is  to  Him  what  an  infertile  seed  is 
in  the  natural  world.  As  he  approaches  that  globe,  the  de- 
stroying angel,  riding  on  a  comet,  reverses  it  on  its  axis  and 
makes  the  continents  become  the  bottom  of  the  sea,  the 
highest  mountains  then  are  islands,  and  the  lands  hitherto 
covered  by  the  seas  reappear  in  all  their  freshness,  obeying  the 
laws  of  Genesis  ;  thus  the  Word  of  God  is  in  power  once  more 
on  a  new  earth  which  everywhere  shows  the  effects  of  terres- 
trial waters  and  celestial  fires.  The  light  the  angel  brings 
down  from  heaven  makes  the  sun  pale.  Then,  as  Isaiah  saith 
(ii.  10,  19),  men  will  enter  into  the  holes  of  the  rocks  and 
hide  themselves  in  the  dust :  'And  said  to  the  mountains 

and  rocks,  Fall  on  us,  and  hide  us from  the  wrath  of  the 

Lamb.'  The  Lamb  is  the  great  emblem  of  the  angels  who 
are  unrecognized  and  persecuted  on  earth. 

"  Christ  himself  hath  said  :  '  Blessed  are  they  that  mourn  ! 
Blessed  are  the  meek  !  Blessed  are  the  peacemakers.'  All 
Swedenborg  is  there :  Suffer,  believe,  and  love.  To  love 
truly,  must  we  not  have  suffered;  must  we  not  believe? 
Love  begets  strength,  and  strength  gives  wisdom ;  this  is  in- 
telligence, for  strength  and  wisdom  include  will.  Is  not  true 

*  Rev.  vi.  16. 
5 


66  SERAPHITA. 

intellect  composed  of  knowledge,  will,  and  wisdom,  the  three 
attributes  of  the  angelic  spirit  ? 

"  '  If  the  universe  has  a  meaning,  that  surely  is  the  worthiest 
of  God,'  said  Monsieur  Saint-Martin  to  me  when  I  saw  him 
during  his  visit  to  Sweden. 

"  But,"  the  minister  went  on,  after  a  pause,  "of  what  value 
can  these  shreds  be,  snatched  from  a  work  so  vast  that  the 
only  way  to  give  you  an  idea  of  it  is  to  compare  it  to  a  river 
of  light,  a  torrent  of  flame?  When  a  man  plunges  into  it,  he 
is  carried  away  by  an  overwhelming  flood.  Dante  Alighieri's 
poem  seems  a  mere  speck  to  the  reader  who  will  dive  into  the 
innumerable  passages  in  which  Swedenborg  has  given  actuality 
to  the  heavenly  spheres,  just  as  Beethoven  builds  up  palaces 
of  harmony  out  of  thousands  of  notes,  and  architects  construct 
cathedrals  of  thousands  of  stones.  He  flings  you  to  infinite 
heights,  where  your  mind  sometimes  fails  to  bear  you  up.  It 
is  necessary  certainly  to  have  a  powerful  brain  if  you  are  to 
come  back  sane  and  safe  to  our  social  notions. 

''Swedenborg  was  especially  attached  to  Baron  Seraphitz, 
whose  name,  according  to  an  old  Swedish  custom,  had  from 
time  immemorial  taken  the  Latin  suffix  us.  The  baron  was 
the  Swedish  prophet's  most  zealous  disciple;  the  eyes  of  his 
inner  man  had  been  opened  by  the  Seer,  who  had  prepared  him 
to  live  in  conformity  with  commands  from  on  high.  He  was 
in  search  of  a  woman  with  the  angelic  spirit,  and  Swedenborg 
showed  her  to  him  in  a  vision.  His  bride  was  the  daughter 
of  a  shoemaker  in  London ;  in  her,  said  Swedenborg,  the  life 
of  heaven  shone  brightly,  and  she  had  gone  through  the  first 
tests.  After  the  prophet  was  translated,  the  baron  came  to 
Jarvis  to  solemnize  his  heavenly  nuptials  in  the  practice  of 
prayer.  For  my  part,  sir,  I,  who  am  no  seer,  could  only  note 
the  earthly  life  of  the  couple,  and  it  was  undoubtedly  that  of 
the  saints  whose  virtues  are  the  glory  of  the  Roman  Church. 
They  alleviated  the  sufferings  of  our  people,  giving  them  a 
portion  which  does  not  suffice  to  live  on  without  work,  but 


SERAPHITA.  67 

which  is  then  sufficient  for  their  needs  j  those  who  lived  with 
them  never  saw  them  moved  to  anger  or  impatience ;  they 
were  invariably  gentle  and  beneficent,  full  of  amiability,  gra- 
ciousness,  and  true  kindness  ;  their  marriage  was  the  harmony 
of  two  souls  in  constant  union.  Two  eider-ducks  in  equal 
flight,  a  sound  and  its  echo,  the  thought  and  the  word,  are 
but  imperfect  images  of  that  union.  Here  they  were  loved 
by  everybody  with  an  affection  which  can  only  be  compared 
to  the  love  of  plants  for  the  sun. 

"The  wife  was  simple  in  her  manners  and  beautiful  to 
behold ;  her  face  was  lovely,  and  her  dignity  worthy  of  the 
most  august  personage. 

"In  1783,  in  the  twenty-sixth  year  of  her  age,  this  woman 
bore  a  child  ;  it  was  a  time  of  solemn  rejoicing.  The  husband 
and  wife  took  leave  of  the  world,  telling  me  that  they  had  no 
doubt  that  they  should  be  transformed  when  the  child  should 
have  shed  the  garb  of  flesh,  which  would  need  their  care  until 
she  "should  have  received  strength  to  live  by  herself.  The 
child  was  born,  and  was  this  Seraphita  with  whom  we  are  just 
now  concerned ;  for  the  nine  months  before  her  birth  her 
father  and  mother  lived  in  greater  retirement  than  before,  up- 
lifting themselves  to  heaven  by  prayer.  Their  hope  was  that 
they  might  see  Swedenborg,  and  faith  procured  its  fulfillment. 
On  the  day  of  Seraphita's  birth,  Swedenborg  appeared  in 
Jarvis,  and  filled  the  room  where  the  babe  was  born  with  light. 
His  words,  it  is  said,  were : 

"  '  The  work  is  accomplished  ;  the  heavens  rejoice  ! ' 

"  The  servants  in  the  house  heard  strange  sounds  of  music, 
brought,  they  declared,  by  the  winds  from  the  four  points  of 
the  compass. 

"The  spirit  of  Swedenborg  led  the  father  out  of  the  house 
and  out  on  the  fiord,  where  it  left  him.  Some  men  of  Jarvis, 
going  up  to  the  baron,  heard  him  repeating  these  soothing 
words  from  Scripture :  '  How  beautiful  upon  the  mountains 
are  the  feet  of  him  that  bringeth  good-tidings ! ' 


68  SERAPHITA. 

"  I  was  setting  out  from  the  manse  to  go  to  the  castle,  in- 
tending to  baptize  the  child,  and  carry  out  the  duties  enjoined 
on  me  by  law,  when  I  met  the  baron. 

"  'Your  ministrations  are  superfluous,'  said  he;  '  our  child 
is  to  be  nameless  on  earth.  You  will  not  baptize  with  earthly 
waters  one  who  has  been  bathed  in  fires  from  heaven.  This 
child  will  always  be  a  flower ;  you  will  not  see  it  grow  old ; 
you  will  see  it  pass  away.  You  have  existence,  it  has  life  ; 
you  have  external  senses,  it  has  not;  it  is  wholly  inward.' 
The  words  were  uttered  in  a  supernatural  voice,  which  im- 
pressed me  even  more  than  the  brightness  of  his  face,  which 
shed  a  radiance.  His  whole  appearance  was  a  realization  of 
the  fantastic  ideas  we  form  of  inspired  men,  as  we  read  the 
prophecies  in  the  Bible.  Still,  such  effects  are  not  rare  in 
our  mountains,  where  the  nitre  formed  in  the  perpetual  snows 
produces  singular  effects  on  our  persons. 

"  I  asked  him  the  cause  of  his  agitation. 

"  '  Swedenborg  has  appeared  ;  I  have  just  parted  from  him ; 
I  have  breathed  the  air  of  heaven,'  said  he. 

"  '  Under  what  form  did  he  appear  to  you  ? '  I  asked. 

"  '  Under  his  mortal  aspect,  dressed  as  he  was  the  last  time 
I  saw  him  in  London  with  Richard  Shearsmith,  near  Coldbath 
Fields,  in  July,  1771.  He  had  on  his  shot  velveteen  coat 
with  steel  buttons,  a  high  vest,  a  white  cravat,  and  the  same 
imposing  wig,  with  heavy,  powdered  curls  at  the  side,  and 
the  hair  combed  back  from  the  forehead,  showing  that  broad 
and  luminous  brow  in  harmony  with  his  large,  square  face,  so 
full  of  calm  power.  I  recognized  his  nose  with  its  open, 
ardent  nostrils  ;  the  mouth  that  always  smiled — an  angel's 
mouth,  from  which  fell  these  words  of  promised  happiness, 
"We  meet  again,  soon  !  "  And  I  felt  the  glory  of  heavenly 
love.' 

"The  conviction  stamped  on  the  baron's  face  prohibited 
any  discussion  ;  I  listened  in  silence  ;  his  voice  had  an  in- 
fectious fervor  that  warmed  me  to  the  core ;  his  enthusiasm 


SERAPHITA.  69 

stirred  my  heart,  as  another  man's  anger  can  thrill  one's 
nerves.  I  followed  him,  without  speaking,  home  to  his  house, 
where  I  saw  the  nameless  child  lying  mysteriously  wrapped  on 
her  mother's  bosom.  Seraphita  heard  me  come  in  and  raised 
her  head  toward  me  ;  her  eyes  were  not  those  of  an  ordinary 
infant ;  to  express  the  impression  they  produced  on  me,  I  can 
only  say  they  already  saw  and  understood. 

"The  childhood  of  this  predestined  being  was  marked  by 
some  extraordinary  circumstances  of  climate.  For  nine  years 
our  winters  were  milder  and  our  summers  longer  than  usual. 
This  phenomenon  gave  rise  to  much  discussion  among  the 
learned  ;  but  their  explanations,  which  seemed  inadequate  to 
the  doctors  of  the  Academy,  made  the  baron  smile  when  I 
repeated  them  to  him. 

"  Seraphita  was  never  seen  perfectly  nude,  as  children  are 
sometimes  ;  she  was  never  touched  by  the  hand  of  man  or 
woman ;  she  lay  spotless  on  her  mother's  breast,  and  she 
never  cried.  Old  David  will  confirm  these  facts  if  you  ques- 
tion him  about  his  mistress,  for  whom  he  feels  such  veneration 
as  the  king  whose  name  he  bears  had  for  the  Ark  of  God. 

"At  the  age  of  nine  the  child  began  to  be  absorbed  in 
prayer.  Prayer  is  her  life  ;  you  saw  her  in  our  church  on 
Christmas  Day,  the  only  day  she  ever  comes  there.  She  is 
placed  apart  from  the  other  worshipers  by  a  considerable  dis- 
tance. If  this  space  is  not  left  about  her,  she  suffers.  Indeed, 
she  spends  most  of  her  time  indoors.  The  details  of  her  life 
are,  however,  unknown  ;  she  never  shows  herself;  her  facul- 
ties, her  feelings  are  essentially  inward  ;  she  is  commonly  in 
the  state  of  mystical  contemplation,  which,  as  papist  writers 
tell  us,  was  familiar  to  the  first  Christian  recluses,  in  whom 
dwelt  the  tradition  of  Christ's  teaching.  Her  understanding, 
her  soul,  her  body,  everything  about  her.  is  as  virginal  as  the 
snow  on  our  mountains.  At  ten  years  old  she  was  what  you 
see  her  now. 

"  When  she  was  nine  her  father  and  mother  died  at  the 


70  SERAPHITA. 

same  instant  without  pain,  without  any  visible  malady,  after 
naming  the  hour  at  which  they  should  cease  to  breathe.  She, 
standing  at  their  feet,  looked  on  them  with  a  calm  eye,  dis- 
playing neither  grief,  nor  pain,  nor  joy,  nor  curiosity;  her 
father  and  mother  smiled  at  her. 

"When  we  went  in  to  carry  away  the  two  bodies,  she 
said — 

" '  Take  them  away  ! ' 

"  '  Seraphita,'  said  I,  for  we  called  her  by  that  name,  'are 
you  not  grieved  by  your  father's  and  mother's  death  ?  They 
loved  you  so  well.' 

"'Dead?'  said  she.  'No,  they  are  still  in  me.  This  is 
nothing,'  she  added,  pointing  to  the  bodies  they  were  taking 
away. 

"This  was  the  third  time  I  had  seen  her  since  her  birth. 
It  is  difficult  to  see  her  in  church  ;  she  stands  near  the  pillar 
that  supports  the  pulpit,  in  such  a  dark  corner  that  it  is  hardly 
possible  to  discern  her  features. 

"Of  all  the  servants  of  the  house,  none  were  left  at  the 
time  of  that  event  but  old  David,  who,  though  he  is  eighty- 
two  years  old,  manages  to  do  all  his  mistress  needs.  Some  of 
the  people  of  Jarvis  have  strange  tales  about  the  girl.  Their 
stories  having  assumed  some  consistency  in  a  land  that  is 
greatly  addicted  to  mysteries,  I  set  to  work  to  study  Jean 
Wier's  'Treatise  on  Sorcery,'  and  other  works  on  demon- 
ology,  in  which  the  effects  on  man  of  the  supernatural  (so- 
called)  are  recorded,  in  search  of  facts  analogous  to  what  are 
ascribed  to  her " 

"  Then  you  do  not  believe  in  her?  "  asked  Wilfrid. 

"Indeed,  yes,"  said  the  pastor  with  simplicity,  "in  so  far 
that  I  regard  her  as  a  most  fantastic  creature,  spoilt  by  her 
parents,  who  have  turned  her  brain  by  the  religious  notions  I 
have  set  forth  to  you." 

Minna  shook  her  head  in  a  gentle  expression  of  negation. 

"  Poor  girl !  "  the  pastor  went  on,  "  she  has  inherited  from 


SERAPHITA.  71 

her  parents  the  fatal  enthusiasm  which  misleads  mystics  and 
makes  them  more  or  less  crazy.  She  fasts  in  a  way  that  drives 
poor  David  to  despair.  The  good  old  man  is  like  some  frail 
plant  that  trembles  at  a  breath  of  wind  and  basks  in  the 
smallest  gleam  of  sunshine.  His  mistress,  whose  incompre- 
hensible language  he  has  adopted,  is  to  him  the  breeze  and 
sunshine ;  to  him  her  feet  are  diamonds,  her  forehead  crowned 
with  stars;  she  moves  environed  by  a  white  and  luminous 
halo ;  her  voice  has  an  accompaniment  of  music ;  she  has  the 
gift  of  becoming  invisible.  Ask  to  see  her ;  he  will  tell  you 
that  she  is  wandering  through  astral  worlds.  It  is  difficult  to 
believe  such  fables.  Every  such  miracle,  you  know,  is  more 
or  less  like  the  story  of  the  Golden  Tooth:  we  have  our 
golden  tooth  at  Jarvis,  that  is  all. 

"  For  instance,  Duncker,  the  fisherman,  declares  that  he  has 
seen  her  plunging  into  the  fiord  and  coming  to  the  surface  in 
the  form  of  an  eider-duck,  or  walking  on  the  waves  during  a 
storm.  Fergus,  who  tends  the  herds  on  the  safer,  says  that, 
in  rainy  weather,  he  has  seen  the  sky  always  clear  over  the 
Swedish  castle,  and  always  blue  over  Seraphita's  head  if  she 
goes  out.  Several  women  hear  the  chords  of  an  immense 
organ  when  Seraphita  comes  to  church,  and  ask  their  neigh- 
bors quite  seriously  if  they  do  not  also  hear  it. 

"  However,  my  daughter,  to  whom  Seraphita  has  taken  a 
great  fancy  these  two  years  past,  has  heard  no  music,  and  has 
not  perceived  the  heavenly  perfumes  which  embalm  the  air, 
they  say,  wherever  she  goes.  Minna  has  often  come  home 
full  of  a  simple  girl's  admiration  for  the  beauties  of  the  spring; 
she  is  enraptured  by  the  fragrance  of  the  first  tender  larch 
shoots,  the  fir-trees,  and  the  flowers  they  have  enjoyed  to- 
gether ;  but  after  our  long  winter  nothing  can  be  more  natural 
than  such  intense  delight.  There  is  nothing  very  remarkable 
in  the  conversation  of  that  being,  is  there,  my  child?" 

"His  secrets  are  not  mine,"  replied  Minna.  "When  I 
am  with  him,  I  know  all  things;  away  from  him,  I  know 


72  SERAPHITA. 

nothing;  with  him,  I  cease  to  be  myself;  away  from  him,  I 
forget  that  more  perfect  life.  Seeing  him  is  as  a  dream,  of 
which  my  remembrance  depends  on  his  will.  I  may  have 
heard,  when  with  him,  the  music  of  which  Bancker's  wife  and 
Erikson's  speak,  and  forget  it  when  we  are  apart ;  I  may  have 
perceived  those  celestial  perfumes  and  have  beheld  marvels, 
and  yet  know  nothing  of  them  here." 

"What  has  most  surprised  me  since  I  first  knew  her,"  said 
the  pastor  to  Wilfrid,  "is  that  she  should  allow  you  to  ap- 
proach her." 

"To  approach  her!  "  said  the  stranger.  "She  has  never 
allowed  me  to  kiss  nor  even  to  touch  her  hand.  The  first 
time  I  saw  her  she  abashed  me  by  her  look,  and  said,  '  You 
are  welcome  here ;  you  were  due  to  come. '  It  was  as  though 
she  knew  me.  I  trembled.  My  fear  makes  me  believe  in 
her." 

"And  my  love,"  said  Minna,  without  a  blush. 

"Are  you  making  fun  of  me?"  said  the  pastor,  laughing 
with  good-humor;  "you,  my  child,  in  calling  yourself  a 
Spirit  of  Love ;  and  you,  sir,  in  making  yourself  out  to  be  a 
Spirit  of  Wisdom?" 

He  drank  off  a  glass  of  beer,  and  did  not  observe  a  singular 
look  which  Wilfrid  gave  to  Minna. 

"Jesting  apart,"  Becker  went  on,  "I  was  greatly  amazed 
to  hear  that  those  two  crazy  girls  had  gone  to-day  for  the  first 
time  to  the  top  of  the  Falberg ;  but  is  not  that  some  exaggera- 
tion ?  The  girls  must  have  simply  climbed  some  hill ;  the 
summit  of  the  Falberg  is  inaccessible." 

"Father,"  said  Minna,  in  some  agitation,  "I  must  then 
have  been  in  the  power  of  the  demon ;  for  we  reached  the 
summit  of  the  Ice-Cap." 

"  This  is  a  serious  matter,"  said  the  pastor.  "  Minna  has 
never  told  a  lie." 

"My  dear  sir,"  said  Wilfrid,  "I  can  assure  you,  Seraphita 
exerts  the  most  extraordinary  power  over  me ;  I  know  not 


"VIOLENCE!     VIOLENCE!"     HE   CRIED. 


SERAPHITA.  73 

what  words  can  give  any  idea  of  it.  She  has  told  me  things 
which  no  one  but  I  could  know." 

"Somnambulism!"  cried  the  old  man.  "Various  cases 
of  that  kind  are  reported  by  Jean  Wier  as  phenomena  easy  to 
account  for,  and  known  of  old  in  Egypt." 

"Lend  me  the  theosophical  works  of  Swedenborg,"  said 
Wilfrid.  "I  long  to  plunge  into  those  lakes  of  light;  you 
have  made  me  thirst  for  them." 

Pastor  Becker  handed  a  volume  to  Wilfrid,  who  immedi- 
ately began  to  read.  It  was  about  nine  o'clock  in  the  evening. 
The  maid  had  just  brought  in  the  supper,  and  Minna  made 
the  tea.  The  meal  ended,  all  three  sat  silently  occupied  ;  the 
pastor  read  Jean  Wier's  "  Treatise  on  Demonology;  "  Wilfrid 
lost  himself  in  the  study  of  Swedenborg;  Minna  sewed  and 
dreamed  over  her  recollections.  It  was  a  thoroughly  Norwe- 
gian scene,  a  peaceful,  studious  evening,  full  of  thought — a 
flower  under  the  snow.  Wilfrid,  as  he  read  the  writings  of 
the  prophet,  was  alive  only  to  his  inward  senses.  Now  and 
again  the  pastor,  with  a  half-serious,  half-ironical  gesture, 
pointed  him  out  to  Minna,  who  smiled  rather  sadly.  To 
Minna,  Seraphitus  smiled  down  upon  them,  floating  above 
the  cloud  of  tobacco  smoke  in  which  they  were  wrapped. 

Midnight  struck.  Suddenly  the  outer  door  was  violently 
pushed  open ;  heavy  but  hasty  steps,  the  steps  of  a  terrified 
old  man,  were  heard  in  the  sort  of  small  hall  between  the  two 
doors.  Then  David  burst  into  the  room. 

"Violence!  Violence  !"  he  cried.  "Come!  all  of  you, 
come  !  The  satans  are  unchained  ;  they  wear  mitres  of  flame ! 
Adonis,  Vertumnus,  the  sirens  !  They  are  tempting  her  as 
Jesus  was  tempted  on  the  mountain.  Come  and  drive  them 
out." 

"  Do  you  recognize  the  language  of  Swedenborg,  pure  and 
unmixed?"  said  the  pastor,  laughing. 

But  Wilfrid  and  Minna  were  gazing  in  terror  at  old  David, 
who,  with  streaming  hair  and  wild  eyes,  his  legs  trembling, 


74  SERAPHITA. 

and  covered  with  snow,  stood  shaking  as  if  he  were  buffeted 
by  a  stormy  wind. 

"What  has  happened?"  asked  Minna. 

"  Well,  the  satans  purpose  and  hope  to  conquer  her." 

The  words  made  Wilfrid's  heart  beat. 

"  For  nearly  five  hours  she  has  been  standing  up  with  her 
eyes  raised  to  heaven,  her  arms  uplifted ;  she  is  in  torment ; 
she  calls  upon  God.  I  cannot  cross  the  line ;  hell  has  set 
Vertumni  to  guard  it.  They  have  raised  a  barrier  of  iron  be- 
tween her  and  her  old  David.  If  she  wants  me,  what  can  I 
do?  Help  me  !  Come  and  pray  !" 

The  poor  old  man's  despair  was  terrible  to  behold. 

"  The  glory  of  God  protects  her  ;  but  if  she  were  to  yield 
to  violence?"  he  said,  with  persuasive  good  faith. 

"  Silence,  David,  do  not  talk  so  wildly.  These  are  facts  to 
be  verified.  We  will  go  with  you,"  said  the  pastor,  "and 
you  will  see  that  there  are  neither  Vertumni  in  the  house,  nor 
satans,  nor  sirens." 

"Your  father  is  blind,"  David  whispered  to  Minna. 

Wilfrid,  on  whom  his  first  reading  of  a  treatise  by  Sweden- 
borg,  hasty  as  it  had  been,  had  produced  a  powerful  effect,  was 
already  in  the  passage  putting  on  his  snow-shoes.  Minna  was 
ready  in  a  moment.  They  rushed  off  to  the  Swedish  Castle, 
leaving  the  two  old  men  to  follow. 

"  Do  you  hear  that  cracking?  "  said  Wilfrid. 

"  The  ice  is  moving  in  the  fiord,"  said  Minna ;  "  the  spring 
will  soon  be  here." 

Wilfrid  said  no  more.  When  they  were  in  the  courtyard, 
they  both  felt  that  they  had  no  right,  no  strength,  to  enter 
the  house. 

"  What  do  you  think  of  her?  "  asked  Wilfrid. 

"  What  a  blaze  of  light !  "  cried  Minna,  standing  in  front 
of  the  drawing-room  window.  "There  he  is — great  God! 
and  how  beautiful !  Oh,  my  Seraphitus,  take  me  to  thee  !  " 

The  girl's  outcry  was  inward  and  inaudible.     She  saw  Sera- 


SERAPHITA.  75 

phitus  standing  lightly  shrouded  in  an  opal-tinted  mist,  which 
was  diffused  for  a  short  distance  all  about  the  apparently  phos- 
phorescent body. 

"  How  lovely  she  is  !  "  was  Wilfrid's  mental  exclamation. 

Pastor  Becker  now  came  up  with  David  ;  he  saw  his  daughter 
and  the  stranger  in  front  of  the  window,  came  close  to  them, 
looked  into  the  room,  and  said — 

"Well,  David,  she  is  saying  her  prayers." 

"But  try  to  go  in,  sir." 

"Why  disturb  her  when  she  is  praying?"  replied  the 
pastor. 

At  this  moment  a  ray  of  moonlight  from  beyond  the  Falberg 
fell  on  the  window.  They  all  looked  round,  startled  by  this 
natural  phenomenon ;  but  when  they  turned  again  to  look  at 
Seraphita,  she  had  vanished. 

"  That  is  strange  !  "  said  Wilfrid  in  surprise. 

"But  I  hear  exquisite  strains,"  said  Minna. 

"  Well,  what  next  ?  "  said  the  pastor ;  "  she  is  going  to  bed, 
no  doubt." 

David  had  gone  in.  They  walked  home  in  silence;  all 
three  interpreted  this  vision  in  a  different  sense.  Pastor  Becker 
felt  doubt;  Minna  felt  adoration  ;  Wilfrid,  desire. 

Wilfrid  was  a  man  of  six-and-thirty.  Though  built  on  a 
large  scale,  he  was  not  ill  proportioned.  He  was  of  a  middle 
height,  like  most  men  who  are  superior  to  the  common  herd  ; 
his  chest  and  shoulders  were  broad  and  his  neck  was  short,  as 
in  men  whose  heart  is  near  their  head ;  he  had  thick,  fine 
black  hair,  and  his  eyes,  of  a  tawny  brown,  had  a  sunny 
sparkle  in  them  that  showed  how  eagerly  his  nature  absorbed 
light.  If  his  strong  and  irregular  features  were  lacking  in 
that  internal  calm  which  is  given  by  a  life  free  from  storms, 
they  revealed  the  inexhaustible  forces  of  ardent  senses  and  in- 
stinctive appetites;  just  as  his  movements  showed  the  perfec- 
tion of  physical  structure,  adaptability  of  nature,  and  respon- 


76  SERAPHITA. 

sive  actioij.  This  man  might  hold  his  own  with  the  savage  ; 
might  hear,  as  he  does,  the  footfall  of  the  enemy  in  the  depths 
of  the  forest,  scent  his  trail  in  the  air,  and  see  a  friendly  sig- 
nal on  the  remote  horizon.  His  sleep  was  light,  like  that  of 
creatures  alert  against  surprise.  His  frame  quickly  adapted 
itself  to  the  climate  of  any  country  whither  his  stormy  life 
might  lead  him.  Art  and  Science  alike  would  have  admired 
this  organization  as  a  sort  of  human  model ;  everything  was 
truly  balanced,  heart  and  movement,  intelligence  and  will. 

At  first  sight  he  might  seem  to  be  classed  with  those  purely 
instinctive  beings  who  abandon  themselves  wholly  to  material 
needs;  but,  early  in  life,  he  had  made  his  way  in  the  social 
world  to  which  his  feelings  had  committed  him ;  reading  had 
raised  his  intelligence,  meditation  had  improved  his  mind, 
science  had  expanded  his  understanding.  He  had  studied  the 
laws  of  humanity,  and  the  play  of  interests  moved  to  action 
by  the  passions,  and  he  seemed  to  have  been  long  familiar 
with  the  abstract  notions  on  which  society  is  founded.  He 
had  grown  pale  over  books,  which  are  human  actions  in  death; 
he  had  kept  late  hours  in  the  midst  of  festivities  in  many  a 
European  capital ;  he  had  waked  up  in  many  strange  beds  ;  he 
had  slept,  perhaps,  on  a  battlefield  on  the  night  before  the  fight 
and  the  night  after  a  victory ;  his  tempestuous  youth  might 
have  tossed  him  on  to  the  deck  of  a  pirate  ship  in  the  most 
dissimilar  quarters  of  the  globe ;  thus  he  was  experienced  in 
living  human  action.  So  he  knew  the  present  and  the  past; 
both  chapters  of  history — that  of  to-day  and  that  of  other 
days. 

Many  men  have  been,  like  Wilfrid,  equally  strong  of  hand, 
heart,  and  brain  ;  and,  like  him,  they  have  generally  misused 
this  threefold  power. 

But  though  this  man's  outward  husk  was  still  akin  to  the 
scum  of  humanity,  he  certainly  belonged  no  less  to  the  sphere 
where  force  is  intelligent.  Notwithstanding  the  wrappers  in 
which  his  soul  was  shrouded,  there  were  in  him  those  inde- 


SERAPHITA.  77 

scribable  symptoms  visible  to  the  eye  of  the  pure-hearted,  of 
children  whose  innocence  has  never  felt  the  blighting  breath 
of  evil  passions,  of  old  men  who  have  triumphed  over  theirs ; 
and  these  signs  revealed  a  Cain  to  whom  hope  yet  remained, 
and  who  seemed  to  be  seeking  absolution  at  the  ends  of  the 
earth.  Minna  suspected  the  slave  of  glory  in  this  man ; 
Seraphita  recognized  it ;  both  admired  and  pitied  him. 
Whence  had  they  this  intuition  ?  Nothing  can  be  simpler  or, 
at  the  same  time,  more  extraordinary.  As  soon  as  man  de- 
sires to  penetrate  the  secrets  of  nature,  where  there  is  no  real 
secret,  all  that  is  needed  is  sight ;  he  can  see  that  the  mar- 
velous is  the  outcome  of  the  simple. 

"  Seraphitus,"  said  Minna,  one  evening  a  few  days  after 
Wilfrid's  arrival  at  Jarvis,  "  you  read  this  stranger's  soul, 
while  I  have  only  a  vague  impression  of  him.  He  freezes  or 
he  warms  me ;  but  you  seem  to  know  the  reason  of  this  frost 
and  this  heat ;  you  can  tell  me,  for  you  know  all  about  him." 

"Yes,  I  have  seen  the  causes,"  said  Seraphitus,  his  heavy 
eyelids  closing  over  his  eyes. 

"By  what  power?  "  asked  the  inquisitive  Minna. 

"I  have  the  gift  of  specialism,"  he  replied.  "Specialism 
constitutes  a  sort  of  inward  vision  which  penetrates  all  things, 
and  you  can  understand  its  processes  only  by  a  comparison. 
In  the  great  cities  of  Europe,  where  works  of  art  are  produced 
by  which  the  human  hand  endeavors  to  represent  the  effects 
of  moral  nature  as  well  as  those  of  physical  nature,  there  are 
some  sublime  geniuses  who  express  their  ideas  in  marble.  The 
sculptor  works  on  the  marble ;  he  shapes  it,  and  puts  into  it  a 
world  of  thought.  There  are  such  marbles  to  which  the 
hand  of  man  has  given  the  power  of  representing  a  wholly 
sublime  or  a  wholly  evil  aspect  of  humanity;  most  beholders 
see  in  these  a  human  figure  and  nothing  more ;  others,  a  little 
higher  in  the  scale  of  human  beings,  discern  some  part  of  the 
thoughts  rendered  by  the  sculptor,  and  admire  the  form;  but 
those  who  are  initiated  into  the  secrets  of  Art  are  in  sympathy 


78  SERAPHITA. 

with  the  sculptor;  when  they  see  his  work  they  recognize  in 
it  the  whole  world  of  his  thoughts.  These  are  the  princes  of 
Art ;  they  bear  in  themselves  a  mirror  in  which  nature  is  re- 
flected with  all  its  most  trifling  details. 

"  Well,  in  me  there  is  a  mirror  in  which  moral  nature  is 
reflected  with  all  its  causes  and  effects.  I  can  read  the  past 
and  the  future  by  thus  looking  into  the  conscience.  You  still 
ask  me  how  ?  Suppose  the  marble  to  be  a  man's  body,  and 
the  sculptor  to  be  feeling  passion,  vice,  or  crime,  virtue,  error, 
or  repentance ;  then  you  will  understand  how  I  could  read 
the  stranger's  soul,  though  you  will  not  understand  specialism; 
to  imagine  what  that  gift  is  you  must  possess  it." 

Though  Wilfrid  was  akin  to  both  the  primitive  and  widely 
different  types  of  men — men  of  might  and  men  of  mind — his 
excesses,  his  stormy  life,  and  his  sins  had  often  shown  him  the 
way  of  faith ;  for  doubt  has  two  sides — the  side  of  light  and 
the  side  of  darkness.  Wilfrid  had  too  thoroughly  squeezed 
the  world  in  both  its  aspects — matter  and  spirit — not  to  have 
felt  the  thirst  for  the  unknown,  the  longing  for  the  Beyond 
which  comes  to  most  men  who  have  knowledge,  power,  and 
will.  But  neither  his  knowledge,  nor  his  actions,  nor  his  will 
had  due  guidance.  He  had  escaped  from  social  life  from  ne- 
cessity, as  a  criminal  flies  to  the  cloister.  Remorse,  the  virtue 
of  the  weak,  could  not  touch  him.  Remorse  is  impotence ; 
it  will  sin  again.  Only  repentance  is  strong;  it  can  end 
everything.  But  Wilfrid,  in  traveling  through  the  world, 
which  he  had  made  his  sanctuary,  nowhere  found  balm  for  his 
wounds ;  nowhere  had  he  found  a  nature  to  which  he  could 
attach  himself.  Despair  had  dried  up  in  him  the  well-spring 
of  desire.  His  was  one  of  those  spirits  which,  having  come 
to  a  conflict  with  passion,  have  proved  themselves  the  stronger, 
and  so  have  nothing  left  to  clutch  in  their  talons;  spirits 
which,  the  opportunity  failing  them  for  putting  themselves  at 
the  head  of  their  peers  to  trample  a  whole  people  under  their 
horse's  hoofs,  would  pay  the  price  of  a  dreadful  martyrdom 


SERAPHITA.  79 

for  the  gift  of  a  faith  to  be  wrecked  upon ;  like  lofty  rocks 
waiting  for  the  touch  of  a  staff  which  never  comes,  to  enable 
them  to  shed  springs  of  running  water. 

Tossed  among  the  snows  of  Norway  by  one  of  the  purposes 
of  his  restless  and  inquiring  life,  the  winter  had  taken  him  by 
surprise  at  Jarvis.  On  the  day  when  he  first  saw  Seraphita, 
the  meeting  wiped  out  all  memories  of  his  past  life.  This 
girl  gave  him  such  intense  agitation  as  he  had  fancied  was 
dead  for  ever.  The  ashes  burst  into  flame  again,  and  were 
blown  away  by  the  first  breath  of  that  voice.  Who  has  known 
what  it  is  to  become  young  and  pure  again  after  growing  cold 
with  age  and  foul  with  impurities?  Wilfrid  loved  suddenly, 
as  he  had  never  loved  ;  he  loved  in  secret,  with  faith  and  awe 
and  hidden  frenzies.  His  life  was  disturbed  to  its  very  source 
at  the  mere  thought  of  seeing  Seraphita.  When  he  heard  her 
speak,  he  was  borne  away  to  unknown  worlds;  he  was  dumb 
in  her  presence — she  bewitched  him. 

Here,  under  the  snows,  amid  the  ice-fields,  this  heavenly 
flower  had  blossomed  on  the  stem — the  flower  to  which  his 
hopes  went  up,  till  now  deceived,  whose  mere  presence  gave 
rise  to  the  new  aspirations,  the  ideas,  the  feelings,  that  crowd 
around  us  to  lift  us  up  to  higher  realms,  as  angels  transport  the 
elect  to  heaven  in  the  symbolical  pictures  suggested  to  painters 
by  some  familiar  spirit.  Celestial  odors  softened  the  granite 
of  this  rock,  light  endowed  with  language  poured  forth  the 
divine  melodies  which  escort  the  pilgrim  on  his  way  to  heaven. 
Having  drained  the  cup  of  earthly  love  and  crushed  it  with 
his  teeth,  he  now  saw  the  cup  of  election,  sparkling  with 
limpid  waters,  the  chalice  that  gives  a  thrist  for  unfading  joys 
to  all  who  approach  it  with  lips  of  faith  so  ardent  that  the 
crystal  does  not  break  at  their  touch.  He  had  met  with  the 
walls  of  brass  he  had  been  seeking  throughout  the  world 
that  he  might  climb  them. 

He  flew  to  Seraphita,  intending  to  express  to  her  the  vehe- 
mence of  a  passion  under  which  he  was  plunging,  like  the  horse 


fO  SERAPHITA. 

in  the  story  under  the  bronze  rider  whom  nothing  can  move, 
who  sits  firm,  and  whose  weight  grows  greater  as  the  fiery 
steed  tries  to  throw  him.  He  went  to  tell  her  his  life,  to  dis- 
play the  greatness  of  his  soul  by  the  greatness  of  his  sins,  to 
show  her  the  rains  in  his  desert.  Bat  as  soon  as  he  had 
entered  the  precincts,  and  fonnd  himself  in  the  vast  domain 
surveyed  by  those  eyes  whose  heavenly  bloc  knew  no  li- 
the present  or  in  the  past,  he  became  as  calm  and  submissive 
as  a  lion  when,  rushing  on  his  prey  on  the  African  plain,  he 
scents  a  love  message  on  the  wings  of  the  breeze,  and  stands 
still.  A  golf  opened  before  him  in  which  the  words  of  his 
delirium  were  lost,  and  whence  a  voice  came  up  that  trans- 
formed him :  he  was  a  boy  again,  a  boy  of  sixteen,  shy  and 
bashful  before  this  maiden  of  the  tranquil  brow,  this  white 
creature  whose  immovable  calm  was  like  the  stern  impassibility 
of  human  justice.  And  the  straggle  had  never  ceased  till  this 
evening  when,  with  a  single  look,  she  had  at  length  stricken 
him  down  like  a  hawk,  which,  after  describing  bewildering 
spirals  round  its  prey,  makes  it  drop  stunned  before  carrying 
it  off  to  its  eyrie. 

We  have  long  straggles  with  oarself,  of  which  the  outcome 
is  one  of  oar  actions ;  they  are,  as  it  were,  the  inner  side  of 
human  nature.  This  inner  side  is  God's;  the  outer  side 
belongs  to  men. 

More  than  once  had  Seraphita  chosen  to  show  Wilfrid  that 
she  knew  that  motley  inner  part  which  forms  the  second  life 
of  most  men.  She  had  often  said  to  him,  in  her  dov 
tone,  when  Wilfrid  had  vowed  on  the  way  op  that  he  would 
carry  her  off  to  be  his  own  possession :  "  Why  so  much 
vehemence?"  Wilfrid,  when  alone,  was  strong  enough  to 
otter  the  cry  of  rebellion  he  had  given  vent  to  at  Pastor 
Becker's,  to  be  soothed  by  the  old  man's  narrative, 
man — a  mocker,  a  scorner — at  last  saw  the  light  of  a  starlike 
belief  rising  in  his  darkness :  he  wondered  whether  Seraphita 
were  not  an  exile  from  the  upper  spheres  on  her  homeward 


SERAPHITA.  81 

road.  He  did  not  offer  this  Norwegian  lily  the  homage  of 
such  idealization  as  lovers  of  every  land  are  apt  to  squander; 
he  really  believed  in  her  divinity. 

•  Vv~;-;y  was  she  buried  in  the  depths  of  this  fiord?  What  was 
she  doing  there?  Unanswerable  questions  crowded  on  his 
mind.  What  could  happen  between  him  and  her?  What 
fate  had  led  him  hither? 

To  him  Seraphita  was  the  motionless  statue,  as  light  as  a 
shade,  that  Minna  had  just  seen  standing  on  the  brink  of  the 
abyss.  Seraphita  could  thus  confront  every  abyss,  and  nothing 
could  hurt  her ;  the  line  of  her  brow  would  be  unmoved,  the 
light  in  her  eye  would  never  tremble.  His  love,  then,  was 
without  hope,  but  not  without  curiosity. 

From  the  first  moment  when  Wilfrid  suspected  the  ethereal 
nature  in  this  sorceress,  who  had  told  him  the  secret  of  his 
life  in  harmonious  dreams,  he  resolved  to  try  to  subjugate  her, 
to  keep  her,  to  steal  her  from  heaven,  where,  perhaps,  they 
awaited  her.  He  would  be  the  representative  of  humanity, 
is  earth,  recapturing  their  prey.  His  pride,  the  only 
sentiment  which  can  uplift  a  man  for  any  length  of  time, 
would  make  him  rejoice  in  that  triumph  for  the  rest  of  his 
life.  At  the  mere  thought  his  blood  boiled  in  his  veins,  his 
heart  swelled.  If  he  could  not  succeed,  he  would  crush  her. 
It  is  so  natural  to  destroy  what  you  cannot  get  possession  of, 
to  deny  what  you  do  not  understand,  to  insult  what  you 
covet. 

Next  day  Wilfrid,  full  of  the  ideas  to  which  the  extraordi- 
nary spectacle  he  had  witnessed  had  naturally  given  rise, 
wanted  to  cross-question  David,  and  came  to  see  him,  making 
a  pretext  of  his  wish  for  news  of  Seraphita.  Though  Pastor 
Becker  thought  the  poor  old  man  was  childish,  the  stranger 
trusted  to  his  own  perspicacity  to  guide  him  in  discovering 
the  drops  of  truth  the  old  serving-man  might  let  fall  in  the 
torrent  of  his  wandering  talk. 

David  had  the  rigid  but  undecided  expression  of  a  man  of 
6 


82  SERAPHITA. 

eighty ;  under  his  white  hair  his  brow  showed  deep  wrinkles, 
forming  broken  stratifications,  and  his  whole  face  was  fur- 
rowed like  the  dry  bed  of  a  torrent.  All  his  vitality  seemed 
to  be  concentrated  in  his  eyes,  where  a  spark  still  gleamed  ; 
but  even  that  light  was  hidden  behind  clouds,  and  might  be 
either  the  fitful  activity  of  a  feeble  mind  or  the  stupid  glare 
of  intoxication.  His  slow,  heavy  movements  betrayed  the 
chill  of  old  age,  and  seemed  to  communicate  it  to  any  one 
who  gazed  at  him  for  long,  for  he  had  the  strength  of  inertia. 
His  narrow  intelligence  awoke  only  at  the  sound  of  his  mis- 
tress' voice,  at  the  sight  or  the  thought  of  her.  She  was  the 
soul  of  this  merely  material  wreck.  When  David  was  alone 
you  would  have  thought  him  a  corpse  ;  if  Seraphita  appeared, 
or  spoke,  or  was  spoken  of,  the  dead  rose  from  the  grave  and 
recovered  motion  and  speech. 

Never  were  the  dry  bones  that  the  breath  of  God  shall  re- 
vive in  the  valley  of  Jehoshaphat — never  was  that  Apocalyptic 
parable  more  vividly  realized  than  in  this  Lazarus  perennially 
called  forth  from  the  sepulchre  by  the  voice  of  this  young 
girl.  His  mode  of  speech,  always  highly  figurative  and  often 
incomprehensible,  kept  the  villagers  from  talking  to  him;  but 
they  greatly  respected  a  mind  so  far  removed  from  the  vulgar 
routine ;  it  commands  the  instinctive  reverence  of  common 
folk. 

Wilfrid  found  David  in  the  outer  room  apparently  asleep, 
close  to  the  stove.  Like  a  dog  recognizing  a  friend's  ap- 
proach, the  old  man  opened  his  eyes,  saw  the  stranger,  and 
did  not  stir. 

"Well,  where  is  she?"  asked  Wilfrid,  sitting  down  by  the 
old  man. 

David  fluttered  his  fingers  in  the  air  to  represent  the  flight 
of  a  bird. 

"  She  is  not  still  in  pain  ?  "  asked  Wilfrid. 

"  None  but  those  beings  who  are  plighted  to  heaven  can 
suffer  without  any  diminution  of  their  love ;  that  is  the  seal 


SERAPHITA.  83 

of  the  true  faith,"  said  the  old  man  gravely,  like  an  instrument 
responding  to  a  chance  touch. 

"  Who  tells  you  to  say  that  ?  " 

"The  spirit." 

"What  happened,  after  all,  last  evening?  Did  you  force 
your  way  past  the  Vertumni  on  guard?  Did  you  steal  in 
between  the  Mammons  ?  " 

"Yes/'  replied  David,  waking  as  if  from  a  dream. 

The  mist  before  his  eye  cleared  off  under  a  flash  that  came 
from  within,  and  which  made  it  grow  gradually  as  bright  as 
an  eagle's,  as  intelligent  as  a  poet's. 

"  What,  then,  did  you  see  ?  "  asked  Wilfrid,  amazed  at  this 
sudden  change. 

"  I  saw  Species  and  Shapes,  I  heard  the  Spirit  of  all  things; 
I  saw  the  rebellion  of  the  Evil  Ones,  I  listened  to  the  words 
of  the  Good.  Seven  devils  appeared,  seven  archangels  came 
down  to  them.  The  archangels  stood  afar,  they  were  veiled, 
and  looked  on.  The  devils  were  close  at  hand,  they  glittered 
and  moved.  Mammon  was  there  in  a  shell  of  pearl,  in  the 
guise  of  a  beautiful  naked  woman ;  his  body  was  as  dazzling 
as  the  snow,  no  human  form  can  be  so  perfect ;  and  he  said, 
'  I  am  all  pleasure,  and  thou  shalt  possess  me ! '  Lucifer, 
the  Prince  of  Serpents,  came  in  his  royal  attire;  he  was  as  a 
man,  as  beautiful  as  an  angel,  and  he  said,  'The  human  race 
shall  serve  thee  !  '  The  Queen  of  the  Covetous,  she  who  never 
restores  that  which  she  has  taken — the  Sea  herself  appeared  in 
her  mantle  of  green  ;  she  opened  her  bosom  and  showed  her 
store  of  gems,  she  vomited  treasures  and  offered  them  as  a 
gift ;  she  tossed  up  waves  of  sapphire  and  emerald  ;  her  crea- 
tures were  disturbed,  they  came  forth  from  their  hiding-places 
and  spoke ;  the  fairest  of  the  pearls  spread  butterflies'  wings, 
she  glistened,  and  spoke  in  sea-melodies,  saying,  '  We  are 
both  daughters  of  suffering,  we  are  sisters ;  wait  for  me  ;  we 
will  fly  together;  I  have  only  to  be  changed  into  a  woman.' 
The  bird  that  has  the  talons  of  an  eagle  and  the  legs  of  a  lion, 


84  SERAPHITA. 

the  head  of  a  woman  and  a  horse's  quarters — the  ANIMAL — 
crouched  before  her  and  licked  her  feet,  and  promised  seven 
hundred  years  of  plenty  to  this  well-beloved  daughter. 

"  The  most  formidable  of  all,  the  Child,  came  to  her  very 
knee,  weeping,  and  saying,  '  Can  you  forsake  me,  so  feeble 
and  helpless?  Mother,  stay  with  me  ! '  He  played  with  the 
others,  he  shed  idleness  in  the  air;  heaven  itself  might  have 
yielded  to  his  lament.  The  Virgin  of  pure  song  brought 
music  that  debauches  the  soul.  The  Kings  of  the  East  passed 
by  with  their  slaves,  their  armies,  and  their  women ;  the 
Wounded  clamored  for  help,  the  Wretched  held  out  their 
hands :  '  Do  not  leave  us,  do  not  leave  us  !  '  was  their  cry. 

"  I  too  cried,  '  Do  not  leave  us ;  we  will  worship  you — only 
stay ! ' 

"Flowers  burst  from  their  seeds  and  wrapped  her  in  per- 
fume, which  said,  '  Stay  ! '  The  Giant  Anakim  came  down 
from  Jupiter,  bringing  Gold  and  his  comrades,  and  all  the 
Spirits  of  the  astral  worlds  who  had  followed  him,  and  they 
all  said,  '  We  will  be  thine  for  seven  hundred  years.'  At  last 
Death  got  off  his  pale  horse  and  said,  '  I  will  obey  thee  ! ' 
And  they  all  fell  on  their  faces  at  her  feet ;  if  you  could  but 
have  seen  them  !  They  filled  a  vast  plain,  and  all  cried  to 
her,  '  We  have  fed  thee ;  thou  art  our  child ;  do  not  forsake 
us!' 

"At  length  Life  came  up  from  her  ruby  waters  and  said,  '  I 
will  not  desert  thee  !  '  Then,  finding  Seraphita  speechless, 
she  suddenly  blazed  like  the  sun,  and  exclaimed,  'I  am  the 
Light !  '  '  THE  LIGHT  is  there  !  '  replied  Seraphita,  pointing 
to  clouds  where  the  archangels  were  astir.  But  she  was  worn 
out ;  Desire  had  broken  her  on  the  rack ;  she  could  only  cry 
aloud,  '  My  God  !  my  God  !  ' 

"  How  many  Angelic  Spirits  who  have  climbed  the  hill, 
and  are  on  the  point  of  reaching  the  summit,  have  stumbled 
on  a  stone  that  has  made  them  fall  and  roll  back  into  the 
depths  !  All  these  fallen  Spirits  marveled  at  her  constancy ; 


SERAPHITA.  85 

they  stood  there  a  motionless  chorus,  weeping,  and  saying, 
'  Courage ! '  At  last  she  had  triumphed  over  Desire,  un- 
chained to  rend  her  in  every  Shape  and  Species.  She  re- 
mained praying ;  and  when  she  raised  her  eyes,  she  saw  the 
feet  of  the  angels  flying  back  to  heaven." 

"  She  saw  the  feet  of  the  angels?  "  repeated  Wilfrid. 

"Yes,"  said  the  old  man. 

"  This  was  a  dream  that  she  told  you?  "  asked  Wilfrid. 

"A  dream  as  real  as  that  you  are  alive,"  replied  David. 
"I  was  there." 

The  old  servant's  calm  conviction  struck  Wilfrid,  who  went 
away,  wondering  whether  these  visions  were  at  all  less  extra- 
ordinary than  those  of  which  Swedenborg  wrote,  and  of  which 
he  had  read  the  evening  before. 

"  If  spirits  exist,  they  must  surely  act,"  said  he  to  himself 
as  he  went  into  the  manse,  where  he  found  the  pastor  alone. 

"My  dear  pastor,"  said  he,  "  Seraphita  is  human  onry  in 
form,  and  her  form  is  unaccountable.  Do  not  regard  me  as 
mad  or  in  love  :  conviction  cannot  be  argued  away.  Convert 
my  belief  into  a  scientific  hypothesis,  and  let  us  try  to  under- 
stand all  this.  To-morrow  we  will  go  together  to  see  her." 

"  And  then  ?  "  said  the  minister. 

"  If  her  eye  knows  no  limitation  of  space,  if  her  thought 
is  the  sight  of  the  intellect,  allowing  her  to  apprehend  the 
essence  of  things  and  to  connect  them  with  the  general  evolution 
of  the  universe  ;  if,  in  a  word,  she  knows  and  sees  everything, 
let  us  get  the  Pythoness  on  to  her  tripod,  and  compel  the  eagle 
to  spread  its  wings,  by  threats.  Help  me  !  I  breathe  a  con- 
suming fire;  I  must  extinguish  it,  or  be  devoured  by  it.  In 
short,  I  see  my  prey ;  I  will  have  it." 

"It  will  be  a  conquest  difficult  of  achievement,"  said  the 
minister,  "  for  the  poor  girl  is " 

"Is? "  said  Wilfrid. 

"Mad,"  said  the  pastor. 

"I  will  not  dispute  her  madness,"  said  Wilfrid,  "so  long 


86  SERAPHITA. 

as  you  do  not  dispute  her  superiority.  Dear  Pastor  Becker,  she 
has  often  put  me  to  the  blush  by  her  learning.  Has  she 
traveled  much?  " 

"From  her  house  to  the  fiord." 

"  She  has  never  been  away  !  "  cried  Wilfrid.  "Then  she 
must  have  read  a  great  deal? " 

"Not  a  page,  not  a  jot.     I  am  the  only  person  in  Jarvis 
who  has  any  books.     Swedenborg's  writings,  the  only  works ' 
in  the  hamlet,  are  here;  she  has  never  borrowed  a  single 
volume." 

"  Have  you  ever  tried  to  converse  with  her?  " 

"  Of  what  use  would  it  be  ?  " 

"  No  one  has  dwelt  under  her  roof?  " 

"She  has  no  friends  but  you  and  Minna;  no  servant  but 
old  David." 

"And  she  has  never  learned  anything  of  Science  or  Art?" 

''From  whom?"  said  the  pastor. 

"Then,  when  she  discusses  such  matters  very  pertinently, 
as'she  has  often  done  with  me,  what  would  you  infer?  " 

"That  the  girl  may,  perhaps,  during  all  these  years  of 
silence,  have  acquired  such  faculties  as  were  possessed  by 
Apollonius  of  Tyana,  and  by  certain  so-called  wizards,  who 
were  burned  by  the  Inquisition,  which  rejected  the  idea  of 
second-sight." 

"  When  she  talks  Arabic,  what  can  you  say?  " 

"The  history  of  medicine  contains  many  accredited 
instances  of  women  who  spoke  languages  they  did  not  under- 
stand." 

"What  can  I  do?"  said  Wilfrid.  "She  knows  things 
concerning  my  past  life  of  which  the  secret  lay  in  me." 

"We  will  see  if  she  can  tell  me  any  thoughts  that  I  have 
never  spoken  to  any  one,"  said  Pastor  Becker. 

Minna  came  into  the  room. 

"Well,  my  child,  and  how  is  your  Spirit-friend  ?" 

"He  is  suffering,  father,"  said  she,  bowing  to  Wilfrid. 


SERAPHITA.  87 

"  The  passions  of  humanity,  trickled  out  in'  their  false 
splendor,  tortured  him  in  the  night,  and  spread  incredible 
pomp  before  his  eyes.  But  you  treat  all  these  things  as  mere 
fables." 

"  Fables  as  delightful  to  him  who  reads  them  in  his  brain 
as  those  of  the  'Arabian  Nights'  are  to  ordinary  minds," 
said  her  father,  smiling. 

"Then,  did  not  Satan,"  she  retorted,  "transport  the 
Saviour  to  the  summit  of  the  Temple  and  show  Him  the 
kingdoms  at  His  feet  ?  " 

"The  Evangelists,"  replied  Becker,  "did  not  so  effectually 
correct  their  text  but  that  several  versions  exist." 

"You,  then,  believe  in  the  reality  of  these  apparitions?" 
Wilfrid  asked  of  Minna. 

"Who  can  doubt  that  hears  him  tell  of  them?" 

"  Him?     Who?"  asked  Wilfrid. 

"He  who  dwells  there,"  said  Minna,  pointing  to  the 
castle. 

"You  speak  of  Seraphita?"  said  Wilfrid,  surprised. 

The  girl  hung  her  head,  with  a  gentle  but  mischievous 
glance  at  him. 

"  Yes,  you  too  take  pleasure  in  confusing  my  mind.  Who 
is  she?  What  is  your  idea  of  her?" 

"  What  I  feel  is  inexplicable,"  said  Minna,  coloring. 

"You  are  both  mad?"  said  the  pastor. 

"Then  we  meet  to-morrow  evening,"  said  Wilfrid,  as  he 
left. 


IV. 

THE  CLOUDS  OF  THE  SANCTUARY. 

There  are  spectacles  to  which  all  the  material  magnifi- 
cence at  man's  command  is  made  to  contribute.  Whole 
tribes  of  slaves  or  divers  go  forth  to  seek  in  the  sands  of 
ocean,  in  the  bowels  of  the  rocks,  the  pearls  and  diamonds 
that  adorn  the  spectators.  These  treasures,  handed  down 
from  heir  to  heir,  have  blazed  on  crowned  heads,  and  might  be 
the  most  veracious  historians  of  humanity  if  they  could  but 
speak.  Have  they  not  seen  the  joys  and  woes  of  the  greatest 
as  well  as  of  the  humblest  ?  They  have  been  everywhere — 
worn  with  pride  at  high  festivals ;  carried  in  despair  to  the 
money-lender ;  stolen  amid  blood  and  pillage ;  treasured  in 
miracles  of  artistic  workmanship,  contrived  for  their  safe 
keeping.  Excepting  Cleopatra's  pearl,  not  one  has  perished. 

The  great  and  the  rich  are  assembled  to  see  a  king  crowned — 
a  monarch  whose  raiment  is  the  work  of  men's  hands,  but  who, 
in  all  his  glory,  is  arrayed  in  purple  less  exquisite  than  that  of 
a  humble  flower.  These  festivities,  blazing  with  light,  bathed 
in  music  through  which  the  words  of  men  strive  to  be  heard 
in  thunder — all  these  works  of  man  can  be  crushed  by  a 
thought,  a  feeling.  The  mind  of  man  can  bring  to  his  ken 
light  more  glorious,  can  make  him  hear  more  tuneful  harmo- 
nies, show  him  among  clouds  the  glittering  constellations  he 
may  question ;  and  the  heart  can  do  yet  more  !  Man  may 
stand  face  to  face  with  a  single  being  and  find  in  a  single 
word,  a  single  look,  a  burden  so  heavy  to  be  borne,  a  light  so 
intense,  a  sound  so  piercing,  that  he  can  but  yield  and  kneel. 
The  truest  splendors  are  not  in  outward  things,  but  in  our- 
selves. 

To  a  learned  man,  is  not  some  secret  of  science  a  whole  new 
(88) 


SERAPHITA.  89 

world  of  wonders  ?  But  do  the  clarions  of  force,  the  gems  of 
wealth,  the  music  of  triumph,  the  concourse  of  the  crowd,  do 
honor  to  his  joy?  No.  He  goes  off  to  some  remote  nook, 
where  a  man,  often  pale  and  feeble,  whispers  a  single  word  in 
his  ear.  That  word,  like  a  torch  in  an  underground  passage, 
lights  up  the  whole  of  science. 

Every  human  conception,  arrayed  in  the  most  attractive 
forms  that  mystery  can  invent,  once  gathered  round  a  blind 
man  sitting  in  the  mud  by  the  roadside.  The  three  worlds — 
the  Natural,  the  Spiritual,  and  Divine — were  revealed  to  an 
unhappy  Florentine  exile ;  as  he  went  he  was  escorted  by  the 
happy  and  by  the  suffering,  by  those  who  prayed  and  those 
who  cursed,  by  angels  and  by  the  damned.  When  He  who 
came  from  God,  who  knew  and  could  do  all  things,  appeared 
to  three  of  His  disciples,  it  was  one  evening  at  the  common 
table  of  a  poor  little  inn  ;  there  and  then  the  Light  broke 
forth,  bursting  material  husks,  and  showing  its  spiritual  power. 
They  saw  Him  in  His  glory,  and  the  earth  clung  to  their  feet 
no  more  than  the  sandals  they  could  slip  off  them. 

The  pastor,  Wilfrid,  and  Minna  were  all  three  excited  to 
alarm  at  going  to  the  house  of  the  extraordinary  being  they 
proposed  to  question.  To  each  of  them  the  Swedish  castle 
was  magnified  into  the  theatre  of  a  stupendous  spectacle,  like 
those  of  which  the  composition  and  color  are  so  skillfully  ar- 
ranged by  poets,  where  the  actors,  though  imaginary  to  men, 
are  real  to  those  who  are  beginning  to  enter  into  the  spiritual 
world.  On  the  seats  of  that  amphitheatre  the  pastor  beheld 
arrayed  the  dark  legions  of  doubt,  his  gloomy  ideas,  his  vi- 
cious syllogisms  in  argument;  he  called  up  the  various  philo- 
sophical and  religious  sects,  ever  contentious,  and  all  embodied 
in  the  shape  of  a  fleshless  system,  as  lean  as  the  figure  of  Time 
as  imagined  by  man — the  old  mower  who  with  one  hand 
raises  the  scythe,  and  in  the  other  carries  a  meagre  world,  the 
world  of  human  life. 

Wilnid  there  saw  his  first  illusions  and  his  last  hopes;  he 


90  SERAPHITA. 

imagined  human  destiny  incarnate  there  and  all  its  struggles ; 
religion  and  its  triumphant  hierarchies. 

Minna  vaguely  found  heaven  there,  seen  through  a  vista ; 
love  held  up  a  curtain  embroidered  with  mystical  figures,  and 
the  harmonious  sounds  that  fell  on  her  ears  increased  her  curi- 
osity. Hence  this  evening  was  to  them  what  the  supper  at 
Emmaus  was  to  the  three  travelers,  what  a  vision  was  to  Dante, 
what  an  inspiration  was  to  Homer;  to  them,  too,  the  three 
aspects  of  the  world  were  to  be  revealed,  veils  rent,  doubts 
dispelled,  darkness  lightened.  Human  nature  in  all  its  phases, 
and  awaiting  illumination,  could  find  no  better  representatives 
than  this  young  girl,  this  man,  and  these  two  elders,  one  of 
them  learned  enough  to  be  skeptical,  the  other  ignorant 
enough  to  believe.  No  scene  could  be  simpler  in  appearance 
or  more  stupendous  in  fact. 

On  entering,  shown  in  by  old  David,  they  found  Seraphita 
standing  by  the  table,  on  which  were  spread  the  various  items 
constituting  a  "Tea,"  a  meal  which  takes  the  place  in  the 
north  of  the  pleasures  of  wine-drinking,  reserved  for  southern 
lands.  Nothing  certainly  betrayed  in  her — or  in  him — a  won- 
drous being  who  had  the  power  of  appearing  under  two  dis- 
tinct forms,  nothing  that  showed  the  various  forces  she  could 
command.  With  a  homely  desire  to  make  her  three  guests 
comfortable,  Seraphita  bade  old  David  feed  the  stove  with 
wood. 

"Good-evening,  neighbors,"  said  she.  "Dear  Pastor 
Becker,  you  did  well  to  come ;  you  see  me  alive,  perhaps,  for 
the  last  time.  This  winter  has  killed  me.  Be  seated,  pray," 
she  added  to  Wilfrid.  "And  you,  Minna,  sit  there,"  and  she 
pointed  to  an  armchair  near  the  young  man.  "  You  have 
brought  your  work,  I  see.  Did  you  find  out  the  stitch.  The 
pattern  is  very  pretty.  For  whom  is  it  to  be?  For  your 
father  or  for  this  gentleman  ?  "  and  she  turned  to  Wilfrid. 
"We  must  not  allow  him  to  leave  without  some  remembrance 
of  the  damsels  of  Norway." 


SERAPHITA.  91 

"Then  you  were  in  pain  again  yesterday?"  asked  Wilfrid. 

"That  is  nothing,"  she  replied.  "Such  pain  makes  me 
glad  ;  it  is  indispensable  to  escape  from  life." 

"Then  you  are  not  afraid  of  dying?"  said  the  minister, 
smiling,  for  he  did  not  believe  in  her  illness. 

"  No,  dear  pastor;  there  are  two  ways  of  dying — to  some 
death  means  victory,  to  some  it  is  defeat." 

"And  you  think  you  have  won  !  "  said  Minna. 

"I  do  not  know,"  said  she.  "Perhaps  it  is  only  a  step 
more." 

The  milky  radiance  of  her  brow  seemed  to  fade,  her  eyes 
fell  under  her  lids,  which  slowly  closed.  This  simple  circum- 
stance distressed  the  three  inquirers,  who  sat  quite  still.  The 
pastor  was  the  boldest. 

"  My  dear  girl,"  said  he,  "  you  are  candor  itself;  you  are 
also  divinely  kind.  I  want  more  of  you  this  evening  than  the 
dainties  of  your  tea-table.  If  we  may  believe  what  some 
people  say,  you  know  some  most  wonderful  things ;  and  if  so, 
would  it  not  be  an  act  of  charity  to  clear  up  some  of  our 
doubts?" 

"Oh,  yes!"  said  Seraphita,  with  a  smile.  "They  say 
that  I  walk  on  the  clouds ;  I  am  on  familiar  terms  with  the 
eddies  in  the  fiord  ;  the  sea  is  a  horse  I  have  saddled  and 
bridled  ;  I  know  where  the  singing  flower  grows,  where  the 
talking  light  shines,  where  living  colors  blaze  that  scent  the 
air ;  I  have  Solomon's  ring ;  I  am  a  fairy ;  I  give  my  orders 
to  the  wind,  and  it  obeys  me  like  a  submissive  slave  ;  I  can 
see  the  treasures  in  the  mine ;  I  am  the  virgin  whom  pearls 
rush  to  meet,  and " 

"And  we  walk  unharmed  on  the  Falberg,"  Minna  put  in. 

"What,  you  too?"  replied  the  Being  with  a  luminous 
glance  at  the  girl,  which  quite  upset  her.  "  If  I  had  not  the 
power  of  reading  through  your  brows  the  wish  that  has  brought 
you  here,  should  I  be  what  you  think  I  am?"  she  went  on, 
including  them  all  in  her  captivating  gaze,  to  David's  great 


92  SERAPH1TA. 

satisfaction,  and  he  went  off  rubbing  his  hands.  "Yes,"  she 
went  on  after  a  pause,  "  you  all  came  overflowing  with  child- 
ish curiosity.  You,  my  dear  pastor,  wondered  whether  it 
were  possible  that  a  girl  of  seventeen  should  know  even  one 
of  the  thousand  secrets  which  learned  men  seek  diligently 
with  their  noses  to  the  ground  instead  of  with  their  eyes  raised 
to  heaven  !  Now,  if  I  were  to  show  you  how  and  where  plant 
life  and  animal  life  mingle,  you  would  begin  to  doubt  your 
doubts.  You  plotted  to  cross-question  me,  confess?" 

"Yes,  beloved  Seraphita,"  said  Wilfrid.  "  But  is  not  such 
a  desire  natural  to  man  ?  " 

"And  do  you  want  to  worry  this  child?"  she  said,  laying 
her  hand  on  Minna's  hair  with  a  caressing  gesture. 

The  girl  looked  up,  and  seemed  to  long  to  be  merged  in 
the  Being  before  her. 

"  The  word  is  given  for  all,"  the  mysterious  Being  went  on 
very  gravely.  "  Woe  to  him  who  should  keep  silence  even 
in  the  midst  of  the  desert,  thinking  that  none  would  hear. 
Everything  speaks,  everything  hears  here  below.  The  word 
moves  worlds.  I  hope,  Pastor  Becker,  not  to  speak  in  vain. 
I  know  what  difficulties  trouble  you  most :  would  it  not  be  a 
miracle  if  I  could  at  once  apprehend  all  the  past  experiences 
of  your  conscience  ?  Well,  that  miracle  will  be  accomplished. 
Listen  to  me  :  you  have  never  confessed  your  doubts  in  their 
full  extent ;  I  alone,  immovable  in  my  faith,  can  set  them 
before  you,  and  frighten  you  at  your  own  image.  You  are  on 
the  darkest  declivity  of  doubt.  You  do  not  believe  in  God, 
and  everything  on  earth  is  of  secondary  importance  to  the 
man  who  attacks  the  first  cause  of  everything. 

"  Let  us  set  aside  the  discussions  thrashed  out  without 
result  by  false  philosophers.  Generations  of  Spiritualists  have 
made  no  less  vain  efforts  to  disprove  the  existence  of  matter 
than  generations  of  Materialists  have  made  to  disprove  the 
existence  of  the  spirit.  Why  these  contests?  Does  not  man, 
as  he  is,  afford  undeniable  proofs  of  both  ?  Is  he  not  a 


SERAPHITA.  93 

union  of  matter  and  spirit  ?  Only  a  madman  can  refuse  to 
find  an  atom  of  matter  in  the  human  frame ;  when  it  is  de- 
composed, natural  science  finds  no  difference  between  its  ele- 
ments and  those  of  other  animals.  The  idea  which  is  pro- 
duced in  man  by  the  power  of  comparing  several  different 
objects,  on  the  other  hand,  does  not  seem  to  come  within  the 
domain  of  matter.  On  this  I  give  no  opinion  ;  we  have  to 
deal  with  your  doubts,  not  with  my  convictions. 

"  But  to  you,  as  to  most  thoughtful  men,  the  relations 
which  you  have  the  faculty  of  discerning  between  things,  of 
which  the  real  existence  is  made  certain  to  you  through  your 
senses,  do  not,  I  suppose,  seem  material.  The  natural  uni- 
verse, then,  of  things  and  beings  meets  in  man  with  the 
supernatural  universe  of  likeness  or  difference  which  he  can 
discern  between  the  innumerable  forms  in  nature — relations 
so  various  that  they  seem  to  be  infinite ;  for  if,  till  the  present 
day,  no  one  has  been  able  to  enumerate  the  created  things 
of  this  earth  only,  what  man  can  ever  enumerate  their  relations 
to  each  other  ?  Is  not  the  small  fraction  with  which  you 
are  familiar,  in  regard  to  the  grand  total,  as  the  unit  to  the 
infinite? 

"  Hence  here  you  find  yourself  already  made  aware  of  the 
existence  of  the  infinite,  and  this  necessarily  leads  you  to  con- 
ceive of  a  purely  spiritual  sphere.  Hence,  too,  man  is  in 
himself  sufficient  evidence  of  these  two  modes  of  life  :  Matter 
and  Spirit.  In  him  ends  a  finite,  visible  universe;  in  him 
begins  an  infinite  and  invisible  universe — two  worlds  that  do 
not  know  each  other.  Have  the  pebbles  of  the  fiord  any  cog- 
nizance of  their  relative  shapes,  are  they  conscious  of  the 
colors  seen  in  them  by  the  eye  of  man,  do  they  hear  the  music 
of  the  ripples  that  dance  over  them  ?  Let  us  then  leap  the 
gulf  we  cannot  fathom,  the  unthinkable  union  of  a  material 
with  a  spiritual  universe,  the  concept  of  a  visible,  ponderable, 
tangible  creation,  conterminous  with  an  invisible,  imponder- 
able, intangible  creation  ;  absolutely  dissimilar,  separated  by 


94  SERAPHITA. 

a  void,  united  by  indisputable  points  of  contact,  and  meeting 
in  a  being  who  belongs  to  both  !  Let  us,  I  say,  mingle  in  one 
world  these  two  worlds,  which,  in  your  philosophy,  can  never 
coalesce,  but  which,  in  fact,  do  coalesce. 

"  However  abstract  man  may  call  it,  the  relation  which 
binds  two  things  together  must  stamp  its  mark.  Where  ?  On 
what  ?  We  have  not  now  to  inquire  to  what  degree  of  rarity 
matter  may  be  reduced.  If  that  were  indeed  the  question,  I 
do  not  see  why  He  who  has  linked  the  stars  together  at  im- 
measurable distances  by  physical  laws,  to  veil  His  face  withal, 
should  not  have  created  substances  that  could  think,  nor  why 
you  will  not  allow  that  He  should  have  given  thought  a  body. 

"To  you,  then,  your  invisible,  moral,  or  mental  universe, 
and  your  visible,  physical  universe,  constitute  one  and  the 
same  matter.  We  will  not  divide  bodies  from  their  properties, 
nor  objects  from  their  relations.  Everything  that  exists,  that 
weighs  upon  and  overwhelms  us  from  above  and  beneath  us, 
before  us  or  within  us ;  all  that  our  eyes  or  our  minds  appre- 
hend, all  that  is  named  or  nameless,  must,  to  reduce  the 
problem  of  Creation  to  the  standard  of  your  logic,  be  a  finite 
mass  of  matter;  if  it  were  infinite,  God  could  not  be  its 
master.  Thus,  according  to  you,  dear  pastor,  by  whatever 
scheme  you  propose  to  introduce  God,  who  is  infinite,  into 
this  finite  mass  of  matter,  God  could  no  longer  exist  with  such 
attributes  as  are  ascribed  to  Him  by  man.  If  we  seek  Him 
through  facts,  He  is  not ;  if  we  seek  Him  through  reason,  still 
He  is  not ;  both  spiritually  and  materially  God  is  impossible. 
Let  us  hearken  to  the  word  of  human  reason  driven  to  its 
utmost  consequences. 

"  If  we  now  conceive  of  God  face  to  face  with  this  stupen- 
dous whole,  we  find  only  two  conditions  of  relationship  pos- 
sible :  Either  God  and  Matter  were  contemporaneous,  or  God 
was  alone  and  preexistent.  If  all  the  wisdom  that  has  enlight- 
ened the  human  race  from  the  first  day  of  its  existence  could 
be  collected  in  one  vast  brain,  that  monstrous  brain  could 


SERAPHITA.  95 

invent  no  third  mode  of  being,  short  of  denying  both  God 
and  Matter.  Human  philosophers  may  pile  up  mountains  of 
words  and  ideas ;  Religions  may  accumulate  emblems  and 
beliefs,  revelations  and  mysteries,  still  we  are  forced  on  to 
this  terrible  dilemma,  and  must  choose  one  of  the  two  pro- 
positions it  offers.  However,  you  have  not  much  choice,  for 
each  leads  the  human  mind  to  skepticism. 

"  The  problem  being  thus  stated,  what  signifies  Spirit  or 
Matter?  What  does  it  signify  which  way  the  worlds  are 
moving  if  once  the  Being  who  guides  them  is  proved  to  be  an 
absurdity?  Of  what  use  is  it  to  inquire  whether  man  is  ad- 
vancing toward  heaven  or  coming  back  from  it,  whether  crea- 
tion is  tending  upward  toward  the  spirit  or  downward  toward 
matter,  if  the  worlds  we  question  can  give  no  answer?  Of 
what  consequence  are  theogonies  and  their  armies,  theologies 
and  their  dogmas,  when,  whichever  alternative  man  chooses 
in  answer  to  the  problem,  his  God  is  no  more  ? 

"  Let  us  examine  the  first :  Suppose  God  and  Matter  to 
have  been  coexistent  from  the  beginning.  Can  He  be  God 
who  suffers  the  action  and  coexistence  of  a  substance  that  is 
not  Himself?  On  this  theory  God  is  but  a  secondary  agent 
constrained  to  organize  matter.  Who  constrained  Him? 
And  as  between  that  coarser  other  half  and  Him,  who  was  to 
decide?  Who  paid  the  Great  Workman  for  the  six  days' 
labor  attributed  to  Him?  If  there  were,  indeed,  some  co- 
ercing force  which  was  neither  God  nor  matter,  if  God  were 
compelled  to  make  the  machinery  of  the  universe,  it  would  be 
no  less  absurd  to  call  Him  God  than  to  call  a  slave  set  to  turn 
a  mill  a  Roman  citizen.  And,  in  fact,  the  difficulty  is  just  as 
insoluble  in  the  case  of  that  Supreme  Intelligence  as  in  that  of 
God  Himself.  It  only  carries  the  problem  a  step  further 
back ;  and  is  not  this  like  the  Indian  philosophers,*  who  place 
the  world  on  a  tortoise,  and  the  tortoise  on  an  elephant,  but 
cannot  say  on  what  their  elephant's  feet  rest  ?  Can  we  con- 
*  The  Buddhists. 


96  SERAPHITA. 

ceive  that  this  Supreme  Will,  evolved  from  the  conflict  of  God 
with  matter — this  God  greater  than  God — should  have  existed 
during  eternity  without  Willing  what  He  Willed,  granting 
that  eternity  can  be  divided  into  two  periods  ?  Wherever  God 
may  be,  if  He  knew  not  what  His  future  Will  would  be,  what 
becomes  of  His  intuitive  perceptions  ?  And  of  these  two  eter- 
nities, which  is  the  superior — uncreated  eternity  or  created 
eternity  ? 

"  If  God  from  all  eternity  willed  that  the  world  should  be 
what  it  is,  this  fresh  view  of  necessity,  which  is  in  harmony 
no  doubt  with  the  notion  of  a  Sovereign  Intelligence,  implies 
the  coeternity  of  matter.  Whether  matter  be  coeternal  by 
the  Divine  Will,  which  must  at  all  times  be  at  one  with  itself, 
or  whether  it  be  independently  coeternal,  since  the  power  of 
God  must  be  absolute,  it  perishes  if  He  has  not  His  free-will. 
He  would  always  have  found  within  Himself  a  supreme  reason 
which  would  have  ruled  Him.  Is  God  God  if  He  cannot  sep- 
arate Himself  from  the  works  of  His  creation  in  subsequent 
as  well  as  in  anterior  eternity? 

"  This  aspect  of  the  problem  is  then  insoluble  so  far  as  cause 
is  concerned.  Let  us  examine  it  in  its  effects. 

"If  God  the  Creator,  under  compulsion  to  create  the  universe 
from  all  eternity,  is  inconceivable,  He  is  no  less  so  as  perpetu- 
ally one  with  His  work.  God,  eternally  constrained  to  exist 
in  His  creatures,  is  no  less  dishonored  than  in  His  former 
position  as  a  workman.  Can  you  conceive  of  a  God  who  can 
no  more  be  independent  of  His  work  than  dependent  on  it? 
Can  He  destroy  it  without  treason  to  Himself?  Consider  and 
make  your  choice  :  Whether  He  should  some  day  destroy  it, 
or  not  destroy  it ;  either  alternative  is  equally  fatal  to  attri- 
butes, without  which  He  cannot  subsist.  Is  the  world  a  mere 
experiment,  a  perishable  mould  which  must  be  destroyed  ? 
Then  God  must  be  inconsistent  and  impotent.  Inconsistent 
— for  ought  He  not  to  have  known  the  issue  before  making 
the  experiment,  and  why  does  He  delay  destroying  that  which 


SERAPHITA.  97 

is  to  be  destroyed  ?  Impotent — or  how  else  could  He  have 
created  an  imperfect  world  ? 

"And  if  an  imperfect  creation  belies  the  faculties  that  man 
ascribes  to  God,  let  us,  on  the  other  hand,  suppose  it  to  be 
perfect.  This  idea  is  in  harmony  with  our  conception  of  a  God 
of  supreme  intelligence  who  could  make  no  mistake  ;  but, 
then,  why  any  deterioration  ?  Why  Regeneration  ?  Then  a 
perfect  world  is  necessarily  indestructible,  its  forms  must  be 
imperishable ;  it  can  neither  advance  nor  retrocede ;  it  rolls 
on  in  an  eternal  orbit  whence  it  can  never  deviate.  Thus  is 
God  dependent  on  His  work ;  thus  is  it  coeternal  with 
Him,  which  brings  us  back  to  one  of  the  propositions  which 
most  audaciously  attacks  God.  If  the  universe  is  imperfect, 
it  allows  of  advance  and  progress ;  if  perfect,  it  is  stationary. 
So  if  it  is  impossible  to  conceive  of  a  progressive  God,  not 
knowing  from  all  eternity  what  the  result  would  be  of  His 
creation,  can  we  then  admit  a  stationary  God  ?  Would  not 
that  be  the  apotheosis  of  matter,  the  greatest  possible  nega- 
tion ?  Under  the  first  hypothesis,  God  deceases  by  want  of 
power ;  under  the  second,  He  deceases  by  the  static  force  of 
inertia. 

"  Hence,  alike  in  the  conception  and  the  execution  of 
creation,  to  every  honest  mind  the  notion  of  matter  as  con- 
temporaneous with  God  is  a  denial  of  God. 

"  Compelled  to  choose  between  these  two  aspects  of  the 
question,  in  order  to  govern  the  nations,  many  generations  of 
great  thinkers  have  chosen  the  second.  This  gave  rise  to  the 
dogma  of  two  moral  elements,  as  conceived  of  by  the  Magians, 
which  has  spread  in  Europe  under  the  image  of  Satan  con- 
tending with  the  Father  of  all.  But  are  not  this  dogmatic 
formula  and  the  endless  deifications  that  are  derived  from  it 
crimes  of  high  treason  to  the  Divine  Majesty?  By  what 
other  name  can  we  call  a  belief  that  makes  the  personification 
of  Evil  the  rival  of  God,  for  ever  struggling  in  the  throes  of  a 
supreme  intellect  without  any  hope  of  victory?  The  laws  of 
7 


98  SERAPHITA. 

statics  show  that  two  forces  thus  placed  must  neutralize  each 
other. 

"  Now,  turn  to  the  other  side  of  the  problem :  God  was 
preexistent  and  alone. 

"  We  need  not  reproduce  the  former  arguments,  which  are 
equally  strong  in  relation  to  the  division  of  eternity  into  two 
periods — uncreated  and  created.  We  will  also  set  aside  the 
question  of  the  motion  or  the  immobility  of  worlds,  and 
restrict  ourselves  to  the  inherent  difficulties  of  this  second 
thesis. 

"If  God  preexisted  alone,  the  universe  proceeded  from 
Him  ;  matter  is  the  emanation  of  His  essence.  Then  matter 
is  not.  Every  form  is  but  a  veil  hiding  the  Divine  Spirit. 
Then,  the  world  is  eternal ;  then,  the  world  is  God  !  But  is 
not  this  formula  even  more  fatal  than  the  former  one  to  the 
attributes  assigned  to  God  by  human  reason  ?  Does  matter,  as 
emanating  from  God,  and  always  one  with  Him,  account  for 
the  existing  conditions  of  matter?  How  are  we  to  believe 
that  the  Almighty,  supremely  good  in  His  nature  and  His 
acts,  could  beget  things  so  unlike  Himself  that  He  is  not  in 
all  things  and  everywhere  the  same?  Were  there  in  Him 
certain  evil  constituents  which  He  rejected  from  Him  ?  A  con- 
jecture more  terrible  than  offensive  or  ridiculous,  inasmuch  as 
it  includes  the  two  theorems  which,  in  our  former  argument, 
we  proved  to  be  inadmissible.  God  must  be  ONE  and 
cannot  divide  Himself  without  infringing  the  most  important 
of  His  attributes.  Is  it  possible  to  conceive  of  a  portion  of 
God  which  is  not  God  ? 

''This  hypothesis  seemed  so  impious  to  the  Roman  Church 
that  she  made  God's  omnipresence,  even  in  the  smallest  frag- 
ments of  the  eucharist,  an  article  of  faith. 

"  How,  then,  are  we  to  conceive  of  an  omnipotent  intel- 
ligence which  yet  cannot  conquer?  How  unite  it  with 
Nature,  unless  by  direct  conquest  ?  But  Nature  seeks  and 
combines,  reproduces,  dies,  and  is  born  again  ;  it  is  even 


SERAPHITA.  99 

more  agitated  in  the  creative  effort  than  when  all  is  in  a 
state  of  fusion ;  it  suffers  and  groans ;  it  is  ignorant,  degene- 
rate, does  evil,  makes  mistakes,  destroys  itself,  disappears,  and 
begins  again.  How  are  we  to  justify  the  almost  universal 
eclipse  of  the  Divine  element  ?  Why  is  death  ?  Why  was 
the  spirit  of  evil,  the  monarch  of  this  earth,  sent  forth  from 
a  supremely  good  God — good  alike  in  His  essence  and  His 
faculties,  who  could  have  produced  nothing  that  was  not  like 
Himself? 

"And  if,  setting  aside  this  relentless  issue  which  leads  us  at 
once  to  the  absurd,  we  go  into  details,  what  purpose  can  we 
ascribe  to  the  world  ?  If  all  is  God,  all  is  at  once  effect  and 
cause;  or,  more  accurately,  cause  and  effect  do  not  exist. 
Like  God,  all  is  ONE;  and  you  can  discern  no  starting-point 
and  no  end.  Can  the  real  end  be,  possibly,  a  rotation  of 
matter  growing  more  and  more  rare  ?  But  whatever  the  end 
may  be,  is  not  the  mechanism  of  such  matter  proceeding  from 
God  and  returning  to  God,  a  mere  child's  plaything?  Why 
should  He  embody  Himself  so  grossly  ?  Under  what  form  is 
God  most  completely  God  ?  Which  wins  the  day,  spirit  or 
matter,  when  neither  of  those  modes  of  being  can  be  wrong? 
Who  can  possibly  discern  God  in  this  perennial  toil  by  which 
He  divides  Himself  into  two  natures — one  omniscient,  the 
other  knowing  nothing?  Can  you  conceive  of  God  as  play- 
ing at  being  man,  laughing  His  own  labors  to  scorn,  dying  on 
Friday  to  rise  again  on  Sunday,  and  carrying  on  the  play  from 
age  to  age  while  knowing  the  end  from  all  eternity;  and 
never  telling  Himself,  the  Creature,  what  He  is  doing  as 
Creator? 

"The  God  of  the  former  hypothesis,  null  as  He  is  by  sheer 
inertia,  seems  more  possible — if  we  had  to  choose  between  im- 
possibilities— than  that  stupid,  mocking  God  who  destroys 
Himself  when  two  portions  of  humanity  meet  weapon  in 
hand.  Comical  as  this  ultimate  expression  of  the  second  as- 
pect of  the  problem  may  be,  it  was  that  chosen  by  half  the 


100  SERAPHITA. 

human  race  among  nations  that  had  created  certain  gay  myth- 
ologies. These  amorous  nations  were  consistent ;  to  them 
everything  was  a  god,  even  fear  and  its  cowardice,  even 
crime  and  its  bacchanals.  If  we  accept  Pantheism,  the  faith 
of  some  great  human  geniuses,  who  can  tell  where  reason  lies? 
Is  it  with  the  savage  running  free  in  the  desert,  clothed  in  his 
nakedness,  lordly  and  always  right  in  his  actions  whatever 
they  may  be,  listening  to  the  sun  and  talking  to  the  sea?  Is 
it  with  the  civilized  man,  whose  greatest  pleasures  are  due  to 
falsehoods,  who  hews  and  hammers  Nature  to  make  the  gun 
he  carries  on  his  shoulder,  who  has  applied  his  intelligence  to 
hasten  the  hour  of  his  death,  and  create  maladies  that  taint 
his  pleasures  ?  When  the  scourge  of  pestilence,  or  the  plough- 
share of  war,  or  the  genius  of  the  desert  had  passed  over  a 
spot  of  earth,  annihilating  everything,  which  came  off  best — 
the  Nubian  savage  or  the  patrician  of  Thebes  ? 

"  Your  skepticism  permeates  from  above  downward.  Your 
doubts  include  everything,  the  end  as  well  as  the  means.  If 
the  physical  world  seems  inexplicable,  the  moral  world  proves 
even  more  against  God.  Where,  then,  is  progress  ?  If  every- 
thing goes  on  improving,  why  do  we  die  as  children  ?  Why 
do  not  nations,  at  any  rate,  perpetuate  themselves?  Is  the 
world  that  proceeded  from  God,  that  is  contained  in  God, 
stationary?  Do  we  live  but  once?  Or  do  we  live  for  ever? 
If  we  live  but  once,  coerced  by  the  advance  of  the  Great  All, 
of  which  we  have  no  knowledge  given  us,  let  us  do  what  we 
will !  If  we  are  eternal,  let  everything  pass  !  Can  the  crea- 
ture be  guilty  because  it  exists  when  changes  are  going  on  ? 
If  it  sins  at  the  moment  of  some  great  transformation,  shall 
it  be  punished  for  it  after  having  been  the  victim  ?  What  be- 
comes of  divine  goodness  if  it  refuses  to  place  us  at  once  in 
the  realms  of  happiness — if  such  there  be  ?  What  becomes  of 
God's  foreknowledge  if  He  does  not  know  the  results  of  the 
trials  to  which  He  subjects  us?  What  is  this  alternative  pro- 
posed to  man  by  all  his  creeds,  between  stewing  in  an  eternal 


SERAPHITA.  101 

caldron  and  wandering  in  a  white  robe  with  a  palm  in  his 
hand  and  crowned  with  a  halo?  Can  this  pagan  invention  be 
the  supreme  promise  of  God? 

"And  what  magnanimous  spirit  but  sees  how  unworthy  of 
man  and  God  alike  is  virtue  out  of  self-interest,  the  eternity 
of  joys  offered  by  every  creed  to  those  who,  during  a  few 
brief  hours  of  existence,  fulfill  certain  monstrous  and  often 
unnatural  conditions?  Is  it  not  preposterous  to  endow  His 
creature,  man,  with  vehement  senses  and  then  forbid  his  grat- 
ifying them  ? 

"  Beside,  to  what  end  these  trivial  objections  when  good 
and  evil  alike  are  negatived  ?  Does  Evil  exist  ?  If  matter  in 
all  its  manifestations  is  God,  then  evil  is  God. 

"The  faculty  of  reason,  as  well  as  the  faculty  of  feeling, 
being  bestowed  on  man  for  his  use,  nothing  can  be  more  par- 
donable than  to  seek  a  meaning  in  human  suffering  and  to 
inquire  into  the  future ;  if  this  rigid  and  rigorous  logic  leads 
us  to  such  conclusions,  what  confusion  is  here  !  The  world 
has  then  no  stability;  nothing  moves  on,  and  nothing  stands 
still ;  everything  changes,  but  nothing  is  destroyed ;  every- 
thing renews  itself  and  reappears ;  for,  if  your  mind  cannot 
unanswerably  prove  an  end,  it  is  equally  impossible  to  prove 
the  annihilation  of  the  smallest  atom  of  matter :  it  may  be 
transformed,  but  not  destroyed.  Though  blind  force  may 
prove  the  atheist's  position,  intelligent  force  is  inscrutable; 
for,  if  it  proceeds  from  God,  ought  it  to  encounter  any  obsta- 
cles; ought  it  not  to  conquer  them  immediately? 

"  Where  is  God  ?  If  the  living  are  not  aware  of  Him,  will 
the  dead  find  Him? 

"  Crumble  into  dust,  O  idolatries  and  creeds  !  Fall,  O  too 
feeble  keystones  of  the  social  arches,  for  ye  have  never  retarded 
the  destruction,  the  death,  the  oblivion,  that  have  come  upon 
all  the  nations  of  the  past,  however  securely  they  were  founded. 
Fall,  O  morality  and  justice!  Our  crimes  are  but  relative, 
they  are  divine  results  of  which  the  causes  are  unknown  to  us  J 


102  SERAPHITA. 

Everything  is  God.  Either  we  are  God,  or  God  is  not ! 
Child  of  an  age  of  which  each  year  has  left  on  your  brow  the 
cold  touch  of  its  skepticism — Old  Man  !  this  is  the  sum-total 
of  your  science  and  your  long  meditations  ! 

"  Dear  Pastor  Becker,  you  have  rested  your  head  on  the 
pillow  of  doubt,  finding  it  the  easiest  solution,  acting  indeed 
like  the  majority  of  the  human  race.  They  say  to  themselves, 
*  We  will  think  no  more  of  this  question  if  God  will  not 
vouchsafe  us  an  algebraic  demonstration  for  its  solution,  while 
He  has  given  us  so  many  that  lead  us  safely  up  from  the  earth 
to  the  stars ' 

"  Now,  are  not  these  your  secret  thoughts?  Have  I  missed 
them  ?  Have  I  not,  on  the  contrary,  precisely  stated  them  ? 
Either  the  dogma  of  the  two  elementary  principles,  an  antag- 
onism in  which  God  is  destroyed  by  the  very  fact  that  He — 
who  is  Almighty — plays  at  a  struggle ;  or  the  ridiculous  Pan- 
theism in  which  all  things  being  God,  God  is  no  more — these 
two  sources,  whence  flow  the  creeds  to  whose  triumph  the  earth 
is  devoted,  are  equally  pernicious. 

"There,  between  us,  lies  the  two-edged  axe  with  which  you 
behead  the  white-haired  Ancient  of  Days  whom  you  enthrone 
on  painted  clouds ! 

"  Now,  give  me  the  axe  !  " 

The  pastor  and  Wilfrid  looked  at  the  girl  in  a  sort  of 
dismay. 

"Belief,"  said  Seraphita  in  her  gentle  voice — for  the  man 
had  been  speaking  hitherto — "  belief  is  a  gift !  To  believe  is 
to  feel.  To  believe  in  God,  you  must  feel  God.  This  sense 
is  a  faculty  slowly  acquired  by  the  human  being,  as  those 
wonderful  powers  are  acquired  which  you  admire  in  great 
men — in  warriors,  artists,  men  of  science — those  who  act, 
those  who  produce,  those  who  know.  Thought,  a  bundle  of 
the  relations  which  you  discern  between  different  things,  is  an 
intellectual  language  that  may  be  learned,  is  it  not?  Belief,  a 
bundle  of  heavenly  truths,  is  in  the  same  way  a  language,  but 


SERAPHITA.  103 

as  far  above  thought  as  thought  is  above  instinct.     This  lan- 
guage too  can  be  learned. 

"The  believer  answers  in  a  single  cry,  a  single  sign;  faith 
places  in  his  hand  a  flaming  sword  which  cuts  and  throws 
light  on  everything.  The  seer  does  not  come  down  again 
from  heaven;  he  contemplates  it  and  is  silent.  There  is  a 
being  who  both  believes  and  sees,  who  has  knowledge  and 
power,  who  loves,  prays,  and  waits.  That  being  is  resigned, 
and  aspires  to  the  realm  of  light ;  he  has  neither  the  believer's 
lofty  scorn  nor  the  seer's  dumbness;  he  both  listens  and 
replies.  To  him  the  doubt  of  the  dark  ages  is  not  a  lethal 
weapon,  but  a  guiding  clue ;  he  accepts  the  battle  in  whatever 
guise ;  he  can  accommodate  his  tongue  to  every  language ;  he 
is  never  wroth,  he  pities ;  he  neither  condemns  nor  kills,  he 
redeems  and  comforts;  he  has  not  the  harshness  of  an  ag- 
gressor, but  rather  the  mild  fluidity  of  light  which  penetrates 
and  warms  and  illumines  every  place.  In  his  eyes  skepticism 
is  not  impiety,  is  not  blasphemy,  is  not  a  crime ;  it  is  a  stage 
of  transition  whence  a  man  must  go  forward  toward  the  light 
or  back  into  the  darkness. 

"  So  now,  dear  pastor,  let  us  reason  together.  You  do  not 
believe  in  God.  Why?  God,  as  you  express  it,  is  incom- 
prehensible and  inexplicable.  I  grant  it.  I  will  not  retort 
that  to  comprehend  God  altogether  is  to  be  God.  I  will  not 
tell  you  that  you  deny  what  you  think  inexplicable  simply  to 
give  myself  a  right  of  affirming  what  seems  to  me  believable. 
To  you  there  is  an  evident  fact  dwelling  within  you.  In  you 
matter  is  conterminous  with  intelligence ;  and  yet  you  think 
that  human  intelligence  will  end  in  darkness,  in  doubt,  in 
nothingness?  Even  if  God  seems  to  you  incomprehensible 
and  inexplicable,  confess  at  least  that  in  all  physical  phe- 
nomena you  recognize  in  Him  a  consistent  and  exquisite 
craftsman. 

"  Then  why  should  His  logic  end  at  man,  as  His  most 
finished  work?  Though  the  question  may  not  be  convincing, 


104  SERAPHITA. 

it  deserves  some  consideration  at  any  rate.  Though  you  deny 
God,  to  give  a  basis  to  your  doubts,  you  happily  can  appre- 
ciate certain  double-edged  truths  which  demolish  your  argu- 
ments as  effectually  as  your  arguments  demolish  God. 

"We  both  admit  that  matter  and  spirit  are  two  separate 
creations,  neither  of  which  contains  the  other ;  that  the  spir- 
itual world  consists  of  infinite  relations  to  which  the  finite 
material  world  gives  rise ;  and  that  whereas  no  one  on  earth 
has  ever  been  able  to  identify  himself  by  a  sheer  effort  of 
mind  with  the  sum-total  of  earthly  creations,  all  the  more  cer- 
tainly can  he  not  rise*to  an  apprehension  of  the  relations  which 
the  spirit  discerns  between  these  creations.  So  I  might  end 
the  matter  with  one  blow  by  denying  you  the  faculty  of  under- . 
standing  God,  just  as  you  deny  the  pebbles  by  the  fiord  the 
faculty  of  counting  or  of  seeing  themselves.  How  do  you 
know  that  they  may  not  deny  the  existence  of  man,  though 
man  makes  use  of  them  to  build  his  house  ? 

"There  is  one  fact  which  overthrows  you — Infinitude.  If 
you  feel  it  within  you,  how  is  it  that  you  do  not  recognize  the 
consequences?  Can  the  finite  fully  apprehend  the  infinite? 
If  you  cannot  comprehend  the  relations  which,  by  your  own 
admission,  are  infinite,  how  can  you  comprehend  the  remote 
finality  in  which  they  are  summed?  Order,  of  which  the 
manifestation  is  one  of  your  needs,  being  infinite,  can  your 
finite  reason  comprehend  it? 

"Nor  need  you  inquire  why  man  cannot  comprehend  all  he 
can  conceive  of,  for  he  likewise  can  conceive  of  much  that  he 
cannot  comprehend.  If  I  were  to  prove  to  you  that  your  mind 
is  ignorant  of  everything  that  lies  within  its  grasp,  would  you 
grant  me  that  it  is  impossible  for  it  to  conceive  of  what  lies 
beyond  it?  Should  I  not  be  justified,  then,  in  saying:  One 
of  the  alternatives  which  bring  God  to  naught  at  the  bar  of 
your  judgment  must  be  true  and  the  other  false;  Creation 
exists,  you  feel  the  need  for  an  end  ;  must  not  that  end  be  a 
noble  one?  Now,  if  in  man  matter  is  conterminous  with 


SERAPHITA.  105 

intelligence,  why  can  you  not  be  satisfied  to  grant  that  human 
intelligence  ends  where  the  light  begins  of  those  superior 
spheres  for  which  is  reserved  the  intuition  of  the  God  who,  to 
you,  is  merely  an  insoluble  problem  ? 

"  The  species  lower  than  man  have  no  comprehension  of 
the  universe;  you  have.  Why  should  there  not  be,  above  man 
again,  species  more  intelligent  than  he?  Before  using  his 
powers  to  take  measure  of  God,  would  not  man  do  well  to 
know  more  about  himself?  Before  defying  the  stars  that  give 
him  light,  before  attacking  transcendent  truths,  ought  he  not 
rather  to  verify  the  truths  that  immediately  concern  him- 
self? 

"But  I  should  answer  the  negations  of  doubt  by  negation. 
Well,  then,  I  ask  you:  Is  there  here  on  earth  a  single  thing 
so  self-evident  that  I  am  bound  to  believe  in  it  ?  I  will  show 
you  in  a  minute  that  you  believe  firmly  in  things  that  can  act 
and  yet  are  not  beings,  that  can  give  birth  to  thought  and  yet 
are  not  spirits,  in  living  abstractions  which  the  understanding 
cannot  grasp  under  any  shape,  which  nowhere  exist,  but  which 
you  can  everywhere  find ;  which  have  no  possible  names — 
though  you  have  given  them  names;  which,  like  the  God  in 
human  form  whom  you  conceive  of,  perish  before  the  inex- 
plicable, the  incomprehensible,  and  the  absurd.  And  I  will 
ask  you :  If  you  admit  these  things,  why  do  you  reserve  your 
doubts  for  God  ? 

"You  believe  in  Number  as  the  foundation  on  which  rests 
the  edifice  of  what  you  call  the  exact  sciences.  Without 
number  mathematics  are  impossible.  Well,  then,  what  im- 
possible being,  to  whom  life  everlasting  should  be  granted, 
could  ever  finish  counting — and  in  what  sufficiently  concise 
language  could  he  utter — the  numbers  contained  in  the  infinite 
number  of  which  the  existence  is  demonstrated  by  your  reason. 
Ask  the  greatest  human  genius,  and  suppose  him  to  sit  for  a 
thousand  years  leaning  on  a  table,  his  head  in  his  hands,  what 
would  he  answer  ? 


106  SERAPHITA. 

"  You  believe,  you  say,  then,  in  Number — a  base  on  which 
you  have  built  the  edifice  of  sciences  which  you  call  '  exact.' 
You  know  neither  where  number  begins,  where  it  pauses,  nor 
where  it  ends.  Now  you  call  it  time,  anon  you  call  it  space  ; 
by  number  only  does  anything  exist ;  but  for  number  all  sub- 
stance would  be  one  and  the  same ;  it  alone  differentiates  and 
modifies  matter.  Number  is  to  your  mind  what  it  is  to  matter, 
an  intangible  agent.  But  will  you  then  make  a  god  of  it  ? 
Is  it  a  being?  Is  it  a  breath  of  God  sent  forth  to  organize 
the  material  universe,  wherein  nothing  takes  shape  but  as  a 
result  of  divisibility  which  is  an  effect  of  number?  The 
most  minute  as  well  as  the  most  immense  objects  in  creation 
are  distinguished  from  each  other  by  quantity,  quality,  dimen- 
sion, and  force — are  not  these  all  conditions  of  number? 
That  number  is  infinite  is  a  fact  proved  to  your  intellect,  but 
of  which  no  material  proof  is  obtainable.  A  mathematician 
will  tell  you  that  infinity  of  number  is  certain,  but  cannot  be 
demonstrated.  And,  my  dear  pastor,  believers  will  tell  you 
that  God  is  Number  endowed  with  motion,  to  be  felt  but  not 
proven.  He,  like  the  unit,  is  the  origin  of  number  though 
having  nothing  in  common  with  numbers.  The  existence  of 
Number  depends  on  that  of  the  unit,  which  is  not  a  number, 
but  the  parent  of  them  all.  And  God,  dear  Pastor  Becker,  is 
a  stupendous  Unit,  having  nothing  in  common  with  His 
creations,  but  their  parent  nevertheless. 

"  You  must  grant  me  that  you  are  equally  ignorant  as  to 
where  number  begins  or  ends,  and  as  to  where  created  eternity 
begins  or  ends?  Why,  then,  if  you  believe  in  number,  should 
you  deny  God  ?  Does  not  creation  hold  a  place  between  the 
infinite  of  inorganic  substances  and  the  infinite  of  the  Divine 
spheres,  as  the  unit  stands  between  the  infinite  of  fraction — 
lately  termed  decimals — and  the  infinite  numbers  you  call 
whole  numbers  ?  Men  alone  on  earth  comprehend  number, 
the  first  step  to  the  forecourt  leading  to  God,  and  even  there 
reason  stumbles.  What !  you  can  neither  measure  nor  grasp 


SERAPHITA,  107 

the  primary  abstraction  proposed  to  you,  and  you  want  to 
apply  your  puny  standard  to  the  ends  of  God's  purpose? 
What  if  I  should  cast  you  into  the  bottomless  depths  of 
Motion,  the  force  which  organizes  number? 

"  If  I  were  to  tell  you  that  the  universe  is  nothing  but 
Number  and  Motion,  we  should  already,  you  see,  be  speaking 
a  different  language.  I  understand  both  terms ;  you  do  not. 
What,  then,  if  I  should  go  on  to  say  that  motion  and  number 
are  generated  by  the  Word  ?  This  term,  the  supreme  reason 
of  seers  and  prophets,  who  of  old  heard  the  voice  of  God  that 
overthrew  St.  Paul,  is  a  laughing-stock  to  you — you  men, 
though  your  own  visible  works — communities,  monuments, 
actions,  and  passions — are  all  the  outcome  of  your  own  feeble 
word  ;  and  though  without  speech  you  would  still  be  no  higher 
than  the  orang  of  the  woods,  the  great  ape  that  is  so  nearly 
akin  to  the  negro. 

"  Well,  you  believe  firmly  in  number  and  motion,  inexpli- 
cable and  incomprehensible  as  force  and  result,  though  I 
might  apply  to  their  existence  the  same  logical  dilemma  as 
just  now  relieved  you  of  the  necessity  of  acknowledging  that 
of  God.  You,  a  powerful  reasoner,  will  surely  relieve  me  of 
the  necessity  for  proving  that  the  Infinite  must  be  everywhere 
the  same,  and  that  it  is  inevitably  one  ?  God  alone  is  the  In- 
finite, for  there  obviously  cannot  be  two  Infinites.  If,  to  use 
words  in  their  human  sense,  anything  proved  to  you  here  on 
earth  strikes  you  as  infinite,  you  may  be  sure  you  have  in  that 
a  glimpse  of  one  aspect  of  God. 

"To  proceed :  you  have  found  for  yourselves  a  place  in  the 
Infinite  of  number ;  you  have  fitted  it  to  your  stature  by  creating 
arithmetic — if  you  can  be  said  to  create  anything — the  basis 
on  which  everything  is  built  up,  even  society.  Arithmetic,  or 
the  use  of  number,  has  organized  the  moral  world,  just  as 
number,  the  only  thing  in  which  your  professing  atheists  be- 
lieve, organizes  physical  creation.  This  science  of  numbers 
ought  to  be  absolute,  like  everything  that  is  intrinsically  true; 


108  SERAPHITA. 

but  it  is,  in  fact,  purely  relative,  it  has  no  absolute  existence. 
You  can  give  no  proof  of  its  reality. 

"To  begin  with,  though  this  science  is  apt  at  summing  up 
organized  substances,  it  is  impotent  as  applied  to  organizing 
forces,  since  these  are  infinite,  whereas  the  former  are  finite. 
Man,  whose  intellect  can  conceive  of  the  Infinite,  cannot  deal 
with  it  as  a  whole  ;  if  he  could,  he  would  be  God.  Hence 
your  arithmetic,  as  applied  to  finite  things  and  not  to  the  In- 
finite, is  true  in  relation  to  the  details  you  apprehend,  but 
false  in  relation  to  the  whole  which  you  cannot  apprehend. 
Though  nature  does  not  vary  in  her  organizing  forces  and  her 
elementary  causes,  which  are  infinite,  she  is  never  the  same  in 
her  finite  results.  Hence  in  all  nature  you  will  find  no  two 
objects  exactly  alike. 

"Thus,  in  the  order  of  nature,  two  and  two  can  never 
really  make  four,  since  the  units  would  have  to  be  exactly 
equal ;  and  you  know  that  it  is  impossible  to  find  two  leaves 
alike  on  one  tree,  or  two  specimens  alike  of  the  same  species 
of  tree.  This  axiom  of  arithmetic  then,  which  is  false  as  re- 
gards visible  nature,  is  no  less  false  in  the  invisible  nature  of 
your  abstractions,  where  there  is  the  same  dissimilarity  in  your 
ideas  which  are  derived  from  the  objects  of  the  visible  world, 
only  extended  in  their  relations ;  in  fact,  differences  are  even 
more  strongly  marked  there  than  elsewhere.  Everything 
there  being  modified  by  the  temperament,  the  strength,  the 
manners,  and  the  habits  of  individuals,  who  are  never  alike, 
the  most  trifling  matters  are  representative  of  personal  char- 
acter. 

"If  man  has  ever  succeeded  in  creating  a  unit,  it  was,  no 
doubt,  by  assigning  equal  weight  and  value  to  certain  pieces 
of  gold.  Well,  add  a  rich  man's  ducat  to  a  poor  man's,  and 
tell  yourself  that  to  the  public  treasury  these  are  equal  quan- 
tities ;  but  in  the  eyes  of  a  thoughtful  man,  one,  morally 
speaking,  is  unquestionably  greater  than  the  other;  one  rep- 
resents a  month's  happiness,  the  other  the  most  transient 


SERAPHITA.  109 

caprice.     Two  and  two  only  make  four  in  the  sense  of  a  false 
and  monstrous  abstraction. 

"Again :  fraction  does  not  exist  in  nature,  since  what  you 
call  a  part  is  a  thing  complete  in  itself;  and  does  it  not  often 
happen — and  have  we  not  proof  of  the  fact — that  the  hun- 
dredth part  of  some  substance  may  be  stronger  than  what  you 
call  the  whole  ?  And  if  fraction  has  no  existence  in  the  nat- 
ural world,  far  less  has  it  existence  in  the  moral  world,  where 
ideas  and  feelings  may  be  as  various  as  the  species  of  the  veg- 
etable kingdom,  but  are  always  a  whole.  The  theory  of  frac- 
tions, then,  is  another  concession  of  the  mind.  Number,  with 
its  '  infinitely  small '  and  its  '  infinite  total,'  is  a  power  of  which 
a  small  part  only  is  known  to  you,  while  its  extent  evades 
you.  You  have  built  a  little  cottage  in  the  infinitude  of  num- 
ber ;  you  have  adorned  it  with  hieroglyphics  very  learnedly 
designed  and  painted ;  and  you  have  said,  '  Everything  is 
here  !  ' 

"  From  abstract  number  we  will  pass  on  to  number  as  ap- 
plied to  solids.  Your  geometry  states  it  as  an  axiom  that  a 
straight  line  is  the  shortest  way  from  one  point  to  another;  and 
astronomy  shows  you  that  God  has  given  motion  only  in 
curves.  Here,  then,  in  the  same  science,  are  two  facts  equally 
well  proven — one  by  the  evidence  of  your  senses,  aided  by  the 
telescope;  the  other  by  the  testimony  of  your  mind  ;  but  one 
contradicts  the  other.  Man,  who  is  liable  to  error,  asserts 
one,  and  the  Maker  of  the  worlds — whom  you  have  never 
found  in  error — contradicts  it.  Who  can  decide  between 
rectilinear  and  curvilinear  geometry? — between  the  theory  of 
straight  lines  and  the  theory  of  curved  lines?  If,  in  His  work, 
the  mysterious  Maker,  who  attains  His  ends  with  miraculous 
directness,  only  makes  use  of  the  straight  line  to  divide  it  at  a 
right  angle  and  obtain  a  curve,  man  himself  cannot  rely  on  it; 
the  bullet  a  man  wishes  to  send  in  a  straight  line  follows  a  curve, 
and  when  you  want  to  hit  a  point  in  space  with  certainty  you 
propel  the  ball  on  its  cruel  parabola.  Not  one  of  your  learned 


110  SERAPHITA. 

men  has  arrived  at  the  simple  induction  that  the  curved  line 
is  that  of  the  material  world,  and  the  straight  line  that  of  the 
spiritual  world ;  that  one  is  the  theory  of  finite  creation,  and 
the  other  the  theory  of  the  infinite.  Man  alone — he  alone 
here  on  earth  having  any  consciousness  of  the  infinite — can 
know  the  straight  line ;  he  alone,  in  a  special  organ,  has  the 
sense  of  the  vertical.  May  not  the  predilection  for  curved 
lines  in  some  men  be  an  indication  of  the  impurity  of  their 
nature,  still  too  closely  allied  to  the  material  substances  which 
engender  us?  and  may  not  the  love  for  straight  lines,  seen  in 
lofty  minds,  be  in  them  a  presentiment  of  heaven  ?  Between 
these  two  lines  lies  a  gulf  as  wide  as  between  the  Finite  and 
the  Infinite,  between  Matter  and  Spirit,  between  Man  and  the 
Idea,  between  Motion  and  the  Thing  moved,  between  the 
Creature  and  God.  Borrow  the  wings  of  Divine  Love  and 
you  may  cross  that  gulf.  Beyond  it  the  revelation  of  the  Word 
begins ! 

"  The  things  you  call  material  are  nowhere  devoid  of  thick- 
ness ;  lines  are  the  edges  of  solids  having  a  power  of  action 
which  you  ignore  in  your  theorems,  and  that  makes  them  false 
in  relation  to  bodies  regarded  as  a  whole  ;  hence  the  constant 
destruction  of  human  works,  to  which  you  have  unwittingly 
given  active  properties.  Nature  knows  nothing  but  solid 
bodies  ;  your  science  deals  only  with  combinations  of  surfaces. 
And  so  nature  constantly  gives  the  lie  to  all  your  laws ;  can 
you  name  one  to  which  no  fact  makes  an  exception  ?  The 
laws  of  statics  are  contradicted  by  a  thousand  incidents  in 
physics  ;  a  fluid  overthrows  the  most  stupendous  mountains, 
and  so  proves  that  the  heaviest  substances  may  be  upheaved  by 
imponderable  agents.  Your  laws  of  acoustics  and  optics  are 
nullified  by  the  sounds  you  hear  in  your  brain  during  sleep, 
and  by  the  light  of  an  electric  flash,  of  which  the  rays  are  often 
overpowering.  You  do  not  know  how  light  is  brought  to  your 
intelligence  any  more  than  you  know  the  simple  and  natural 
process  by  which  it  is  changed  to  ruby,  sapphire,  opal,  and 


SERAPHITA.  Ill 

emerald  on  the  neck  of  an  Indian  bird,  while  it  lies  dim  and 
gray  on  the  same  bird  under  the  misty  sky  of  Europe,  nor 
why  it  whitens  here  in  the  heart  of  the  polar  regions.  You 
cannot  tell  whether  color  is  a  faculty  with  which  bodies  are 
endowed  or  an  effect  produced  by  the  effluence  of  light. 

"You  believe  the  whole  sea  to  be  salt  without  having  as- 
certained that  it  is  so  in  its  deepest  places. 

"You  recognize  the  existence  of  various  substances  which 
traverse  what  you  call  the  void :  substances  intangible  under 
any  known  form  assumed  by  matter,  and  which  meet  and 
combine  with  it  in  spite  of  every  obstacle.  That  being  the 
case,  you  believe  in  the  results  obtained  by  chemistry,  though 
as  yet  it  knows  no  method  of  estimating  the  changes  produced 
by  the  currents  to  and  fro  of  those  substances  as  they  pass 
through  your  crystals  and  your  instruments  on  the  impalpable 
waves  of  heat  or  of  light,  conducted  or  repelled  by  the  affini- 
ties of  metals  or  vitrified  flint.  You  obtain  no  substances  but 
what  are  dead,  out  of  which  you  have  driven  the  unknown 
force  which  resists  decomposition  in  all  earthly  things,  the 
force  of  which  attraction,  undulation,  cohesion,  and  polarity 
are  manifestations. 

"Life  is  the  mind  of  body;  bodies  are  but  a  mode  of  de- 
taining it,  of  delaying  it  in  its  transit ;  if  bodies  were  them- 
selves living  things,  they  would  be  a  cause;  they  would  not 
die.  When  a  man  establishes  the  results  of  the  motion  of 
which  every  form  of  creation  has  its  share  in  proportion  to  its 
power  of  absorbing  it,  you  call  him  a  learned  man,  as  though 
genius  consisted  in  explaining  what  exists.  Genius  should 
lift  its  eyes  above  effects.  All  your  learned  men  would  laugh 
if  you  should  say  to  them :  '  There  is  a  certain  connecting 
relation  between  two  beings,  such  as  that,  if  one  of  them  were 
here  and  the  other  in  Java,  they  might  feel  the  same  sensation 
at  the  same  instant  and  be  aware  of  the  fact,  and  question 
and  answer  each  other  without  a  mistake.'  And  yet  there 
are  some  mineral  substances  which  exhibit  sympathies  as  far 


112  SERAPH1TA. 

reaching  as  that  of  which  I  speak.  You  believe  in  the  power 
of  electricity  when  it  is  fixed  in  the  lodestone,  but  you  deny 
it  as  emanating  from  the  soul.  According  to  you,  the  moon, 
whose  influence  over  the  tides  seems  to  you  proven,  has  none 
over  the  winds,  over  vegetation,  or  over  men ;  it  can  move 
the  sea  and  eat  into  glass,  but  it  cannot  affect  the  sick ;  it  has 
undoubted  effects  on  one-halt  of  the  human  race ;  none  on  the 
other  half.  These  are  your  most  precious  convictions. 

"  We  may  go  further  You  believe  in  physics ;  but  your 
physics  are  based,  like  the  Catholic  religion,  on  an  act  of 
faith.  Do  they  not  recognize  an  external  force  apart  from 
bodies  to  which  it  imparts  movement  ?  You  see  its  effects, 
but  what  is  it 9  Where  is  it?  What  is  its  essence,  its  life? 
Has  it  any  limits? And  you  deny  God ! 

"  Thus  most  of  your  scientific  axioms,  though  true  in  rela- 
tion to  man,  are  false  in  relation  to  the  Great  Whole.  Science 
is  one,  and  you  have  divided  it.  To  know  the  true  sense  of 
the  laws  of  phenomena,  would  it  not  be  necessary  to  know  the 
correlations  existing  between  the  phenomena  and  the  laws  of 
the  whole  ?  There  is  in  all  things  an  appearance,  a  present- 
ment, which  strikes  your  sense;  behind  this  presentment 
there  is  a  soul  moving — the  body,  and  the  faculty.  Where 
are  the  relations  which  hold  things  together  studied  or  taught? 
Nowhere.  Have  you,  then,  no  absolute  finality?  Your  best 
ascertained  theses  rest  on  an  analysis  of  the  forms  of  matter, 
while  the  spirit  is  constantly  neglected. 

"There  is  a  supreme  science  of  which  some  men — too  late 
— get  a  glimpse,  though  they  dare  not  own  it.  These  men 
perceive  the  necessity  for  considering  all  bodies,  not  merely 
from  the  point  of  view  of  their  mathematical  properties,  but 
also  from  that  of  their  whole  relations  and  occult  affinities. 

"The  greatest  of  you  all  discerned,  toward  the  end  of  his 
life,  that  all  things  were  at  the  same  time  cause  and  effect  re- 
ciprocally ;  that  the  visible  worlds  were  coordinated  to  each 
other  and  captive  to  invisible  spheres.  He  groaned  over 


SERAPHITA.  113 

having  tried  to  establish  absolute  principles.  When  count- 
ing his  worlds,  like  grains  of  sand  scattered  throughout  the 
ether,  he  explained  their  connection  by  the  laws  of  planetary 
and  molecular  attraction.  You  hailed  that  man.  Well,  and 
I  tell  you  that  he  died  in  despair.  Assuming  that  the  centri- 
fugal and  centripetal  forces,  which  he  invented  to  account  for 
the  universe,  were  absolutely  equal,  the  universe  would  stand 
still,  yet  he  insisted  on  motion,  though  in  an  undefined  direc- 
tion ;  but  assuming  the  forces  to  be  unequal,  the  worlds  must 
at  once  fall  into  confusion.  Thus  his  laws  were  not  final ; 
there  was  another  problem  still  higher  than  that  of  attraction, 
on  which  his  spurious  glory  was  founded.  The  pull  of  the 
stars  against  each  other,  and  the  centripetal  tendency  of  their 
individual  notion,  did  not  hinder  him  from  seeking  the  branch 
from  which  the  whole  cluster  was  hanging.  Unhappy  man  ; 
the  more  he  extended  space,  the  heavier  was  his  load.  He 
told  you  that  every  part  was  in  equilibrium ;  but  whither  was 
the  whole  bound  ? 

"  He  contemplated  the  space,  infinite  in  the  eyes  of  men, 
that  is  filled  with  the  groups  of  worlds,  of  which  a  small  num- 
ber are  registered  by  our  telescopes,  while  its  immensity  is 
proved  by  the  rapidity  of  light.  This  sublime  contemplation 
gave  him  a  conception  of  the  infinitude  of  worlds,  planted  in 
space  like  flowers  in  a  meadow,  which  are  born  like  infants, 
grow  like  men,  die  like  old  men,  which  live  by  assimilating 
from  their  atmosphere  the  substances  proper  to  nourish  them, 
which  have  a  centre  and  principle  of  life,  which  protect  them- 
selves from  each  other  by  an  intervening  space,  which  consti- 
tute a  grand  whole,  that  has  its  own  life,  its  own  destination. 

"At  this  prospect  the  man  trembled.  He  knew  that  life  is 
produced  by  the  union  of  the  Thing  with  its  first  Principle  ; 
that  death,  or  inertia — or  gravitation — is  caused  by  a  rupture 
between  the  Thing  and  the  motion  proper  to  it ;  and  he  thus 
foresaw  the  crash  of  worlds,  in  ruins  if  God  should  withhold 
the  Breath  of  His  Word.  Then  he  set  to  work  to  seek  the 
8 


114  SERAPH1TA. 

traces  of  that  Word  in  the  Apocalypse.  You  all  thought  him 
mad.  Know  this :  he  strove  to  earn  forgiveness  for  his 
genius. 

"  Wilfrid,  you  came  to  request  me  to  resolve  equations,  to 
fly  on  a  rain-cloud,  to  plunge  into  the  fiord  and  reappear  as  a 
swan.  If  science  or  miracle  were  the  end  of  humanity,  Moses 
would  have  left  you  a  calculus  of  fluxions ;  Jesus  Christ  would 
have  cleared  up  the  dark  places  of  science  ;  His  apostles  would 
have  told  you  whence  come  those  immense  trains  of  gas  or  of 
fused  metals  which  rush  revolving  on  a  nucleus,  solidifying  as 
they  seek  a  place  in  the  ether,  and  are  sometimes  violently 
projected  within  range  of  a  system  where  they  are  absorbed 
"by  a  star,  or  crash  into  it  by  their  shock,  or  dissolve  it  by  the 
infusion  of  deadly  vapors.  St.  Paul,  instead  of  bidding  you 
live  in  God,  would  have  explained  to  you  that  nutrition  is  the 
secret  bond  among  all  creation,  and  the  visible  bond  among 
all  living  animals.  In  our  own  day,  the  greatest  miracle 
would  be  to  square  the  circle,  a  problem  which  you  pronounce 
impossible,  but  which  has  no  doubt  been  solved  in  the  pro- 
gress of  worlds  by  the  intersection  of  some  mathematical  line, 
whose  curves  are  apparent  to  the  eye  of  spirits  elevated  to  the 
highest  spheres. 

"  Believe  me,  miracles  are  within  us  and  not  without  us. 
Thus  have  natural  effects  been  wrought,  which  the  nations 
deemed  to  be  supernatural.  Would  not  God  have  been  unjust 
if  He  had  vouchsafed  to  show  His  power  to  some  generations, 
and  had  refused  it  to  others  ?  The  brazen  rod  belongs  to  all. 
Neither  Moses  nor  Jacob,  neither  Zoroaster  nor  Paul,  nor 
Pythagoras  nor  Swedenborg,  neither  the  most  obscure  evangel- 
ists nor  the  most  amazing  of  God's  prophets,  have  been  su- 
perior to  what  you  might  become.  Only,  nations  have  their 
day  of  faith.  If  positive  science  were  indeed  the  end  of  all 
human  effort,  how  is  it — confess  now — that  every  social  com- 
munity, every  great  centre  to  which  men  gather,  is  invariably 
broken  up  by  Providence?  If  civilization  were  the  final 


SERAPHITA.  115 

cause  of  the  human  species,  could  intelligence  perish  ?  Would 
it  perennially  continue  to  be  a  purely  individual  possession  ? 

"  The  greatness  of  all  the  nations  that  have  ever  been  great 
has  been  founded  on  exceptions :  when  the  exception  ceased 
to  be,  the  power  was  dead.  Would  not  the  seers,  the  prophets, 
the  evangelists,  have  laid  their  hand  on  science  instead  of 
relying  on  faith ;  would  they  not  have  hammered  at  your 
brains  rather  than  have  touched  your  hearts  ?  They  all  came 
to  drive  the  nations  to  God ;  they  all  proclaimed  the  way  of 
life  in  the  simple  words  which  lead  to  the  Heavenly  King- 
dom ;  and  fired  with  love  and  faith,  and  inspired  by  the  Word 
which  hovers  over  the  nations,  compels  them,  vivifies  them, 
and  uplifts  them,  they  never  used  it  for  any  human  end. 
Your  great  geniuses,  poets,  kings,  and  sages  are  swallowed  up 
with  their  towns,  and  the  desert  has  buried  them  under  a 
shroud  of  sand ;  while  the  names  of  these  good  shepherds 
still  are  blessed  and  survive  every  catastrophe. 

"  We  can  never  agree  on  any  point.  Gulfs  lie  between  us. 
You  are  on  the  side  of  darkness,  I  live  in  the  true  light. 

"  Is  this  the  word  you  desired  of  me?  I  utter  it  with  joy; 
it  may  change  you.  Know,  then,  that  there  are  sciences  of 
Matter  and  sciences  of  the  Spirit.  Where  you  see  bodies,  I 
see  forces  tending  toward  each  other  by  a  creative  impulse. 
To  me  the  character  of  a  body  is  the  sign-manual  of  its  first 
principles  and  the  expression  of  its  properties.  These  princi- 
ples give  rise  to  certain  affinities  which  elude  you,  but  which 
are  connected  with  centres.  The  different  species  to  which 
life  is  distributed  are  unfailing  springs  which  communicate 
with  each  other.  Each  has  its  specific  function. 

"  Man  is  at  once  cause  and  effect ;  he  is  nourished,  but  he 
nourishes  in  return.  When  you  call  God  the  Creator,  you  be- 
little Him.  He  did  not,  as  you  imagine,  create  plants,  animals, 
and  the  stars  ;  could  He  act  by  such  various  means  ?  Must  He 
not  have  proceeded  by  unity  of  purpose?  He  emitted  principles 
which  were  compelled  to  develop  in  accordance  with  His 


116  SERAPHITA, 

general  laws,  and  subject  to  the  conditions  of  their  environ- 
ment? 

"In  point  of  fact,  all  the  affinities  are  bound  together  by 
immediate  similarities ;  the  life  of  worlds  is  attracted  to 
centres  by  a  greedy  aspiration,  just  as  you  are  all  driven  by 
hunger  to  seek  nourishment.  To  give  you  an  instance  of 
affinities  linked  to  similarities :  the  secondary  law  on  which 
the  creations  of  your  mind  rest — music,  a  celestial  art — is  the 
active  evidence  of  this  principle :  is  it  not  an  assemblage  of 
sounds  harmonized  by  number?  Is  not  sound  a  condition  of 
the  air  under  compression,  dilatation,  and  repercussion? 
You  know  of  what  the  air  is  composed?  Azote,  carbon,  and 
oxygen.  Since  you  can  produce  no  sound  in  a  vacuum,  it  is 
evident  that  music  and  the  human  voice  are  the  result  of 
organic  chemical  elements,  acting  in  unison  with  the  same 
substances  prepared  within  you  by  your  mind,  and  coordinated 
by  means  of  light,  the  great  foster-mother  of  this  globe  ;  for 
can  you  have  cogitated  on  the  quantities  of  nitre  deposited 
by  the  snows,  on  the  discharge  of  thunder,  on  plants  which 
derive  from  the  air  the  elements  they  contain,  and  have  failed 
to  conclude  that  it  is  the  sun  that  fuses  and  diffuses  the  subtle 
essence  which  nourishes  all  things  here  below  ?  Swedenborg 
truly  said  :  'The  earth  is  a  man.' 

"All  your  sciences  of  to-day,  which  make  you  so  great  in 
your  own  eyes,  are  a  mere  trifle  compared  with  the  light  that 
floods  the  Seer. 

"  Cease,  cease  to  question  me  ;  we  speak  of  a  different  lan- 
guage. I  have  used  yours  for  once,  to  throw  a  flash  of  faith 
upon  your  souls,  to  cast  a  corner  of  my  mantle  over  you,  and 
tempt  you  away  to  the  glorious  regions  of  prayer.  Is  it  God's 
part  to  stoop  to  you  ?  Is  it  not  yours  rather  to  rise  to  Him? 
If  human  reason  has  so  soon  exhausted  the  limits  of  its  powers 
merely  by  laying  God  out  to  prove  His  existence,  without  suc- 
ceeding in  doing  so,  is  it  not  evident  that  it  must  seek  some 
other  way  of  knowing  Him  ?  That  other  way  is  in  ourselves. 


SERAPHITA,  117 

The  Seer  and  the  believer  have  within  themselves  eyes  more 
piercing  than  are  those  eyes  which  are  bent  on  things  of  earth, 
and  they  discern  a  dawn. 

"Understand  this  saying :  Your  most  exact  sciences,  your 
boldest  speculations,  your  brightest  flashes  of  light,  are  but 
clouds.  Above  them  all  is  the  sanctuary  whence  the  true 
Light  is  shed." 

She  sat  down  and  was  silent;  and  her  calm  features  be- 
trayed not  the  least  sign  of  the  trepidation  which  commonly 
disturbs  an  orator  after  his  least  inflamed  speech. 

Wilfrid  whispered  into  the  pastor's  ear,  leaning  over  him 
to  do  so — 

"Who  told  her  all  this?" 

"I  do  not  know,"  was  the  reply. 

"  He  was  milder  on  the  Falberg,"  Minna  remarked. 

Seraphita  passed  her  hands  over  her  eyes,  and  said,  with  a 
smile — 

"You  are  very  pensive  this  evening,  gentlemen.  You  treat 
me  and  Minna  like  men  to  whom  you  would  talk  politics  or 
discuss  trade,  while  we  are  but  girls  to  whom  you  should  tell 
fairy-tales  while  drinking  tea,  as  is  the  custom,  Monsieur 
Wilfrid,  in  our  evenings  in  Norway.  Come,  Pastor  Becker, 
tell  me  some  Saga  which  I  do  not  know.  That  of  Frithiof, 
in  which  you  believe,  and  which  you  promised  to  tell  me,  or 
the  story  of  the  peasant's  son  who  has  a  ship  that  speaks  and 
has  a  soul  ?  I  dream  of  the  frigate  Ellida.  Is  it  not  on  that 
fairy  vessel  that  girls  should  sail  the  seas?" 

"  Since  we  have  come  down  to  Jarvis  again,"  said  Wilfrid, 
whose  eyes  were  fixed  on  Seraphita  as  those  of  a  robber  hidden 
in  the  gloom  are  fixed  on  the  spot  where  treasure  lies,  "tell 
me  why  you  do  not  marry  ?  " 

"You  are  all  born  widowers  or  widows,"  replied  she. 
"My  marriage  was  decided  on  at  my  birth;  I  am  be- 
trothed  " 

"  To  whom  ?  "  they  all  asked  in  a  breath. 


118  SERAPHITA. 

"Allow  me  to  keep  my  secret,"  said  she.  "  I  promise,  if 
our  Father  will  grant  it,  to  invite  you  to  that  mysterious 
wedding." 

"Is  it  to  be  soon?" 

"I  am  waiting." 

A  long  silence  ensued. 

"The  spring  is  come,"  said  Seraphita.  "The  "noise  of 
waters  and  of  breaking  ice  has  begun ;  will  you  not  come  to 
hail  the  first  springtime  of  the  new  century?" 

She  rose  and,  followed  by  Wilfrid,  went  to  a  window  which 
David  had  thrown  open.  After  the  long  stillness  of  winter, 
the  vast  waters  were  stirring  beneath  the  ice,  and  sang  through 
the  fiord  like  music;  for  there  are  sounds  which  distance 
glorifies,  and  which  reach  the  ear  in  waves  that  seem  to  bring 
refreshment  and  light. 

"  Cease,  Wilfrid,"  said  she,  "  cease  to  cherish  evil  thoughts 
whose  triumph  will  be  a  torment  to  endure.  Who  could  fail 
to  read  your  wishes  in  the  sparkle  of  your  eyes  ?  Be  good ; 
take  a  step  in  well-doing !  Is  it  not  a  step  beyond  the  mere 
love  of  men  to  sacrifice  yourself  entirely  to  the  happiness  of 
the  one  you  love  ?  Submit  to  me,  and  I  will  lead  you  into  a 
path  where  you  will  attain  to  all  the  greatness  you  dream  of, 
and  where  love  will  be  really  infinite." 

She  left  Wilfrid  lost  in  thought. 

"  Can  this  gentle  creature  really  be  the  prophetess  who  but 
now  flashed  lightnings  from  her  eyes,  whose  words  thundered 
above  the  worlds,  whose  hand  wielded  the  axe  of  Doubt  in 
defiance  of  our  sciences?"  said  he  to  himself.  "  Have  we 
been  asleep  for  these  few  minutes?" 

"  Minna,"  said  Seraphitus,  returning  to  the  pastor's  daughter, 
"  the  eagles  gather  where  the  dead  lie,  the  turtle-dove  flies  to 
the  springs  of  living  water  under  green  and  peaceful  groves. 
The  eagle  soars  to  the  skies,  the  dove  descends  from  them. 
Venture  no  more  into  regions  where  you  will  find  neither  foun- 
tains nor  shade.  If  this  morning  you  could  not  look  into  the 


SERAPHITA.  119 

gulf  without  destruction,  keep  your  powers  for  him  who  will 
love  you.  Go,  poor  child,  I  am  betrothed,  as  you  know." 

Minna  rose  and  went  with  Seraphitus  to  the  window,  where 
Wilfrid  still  was  standing.  They  could  all  three  hear  the  Sieg 
leaping  under  the  force  of  the  upper  waters,  which  were  bring- 
ing down  the  trees  that  had  been  frozen  into  the  ice.  The 
fiord  had  found  its  voice  again.  Illusion  was  over.  They 
wondered  at  Nature  bursting  her  bonds,  and  answering  in 
noble  harmonies  to  the  Spirit  whose  call  had  awakened  her. 

When  the  three  guests  had  left  this  mysterious  being,  they 
were  filled  with  an  indefinable  feeling  which  was  not  sleep, 
nor  torpor,  nor  astonishment,  but  a  mixture  of  all  three, 
which  was  neither  twilight  nor  daybreak,  but  which  made 
them  long  for  light.  They  were  all  very  thoughtful. 

"  I  begin  to  think  that  she  is  a  spirit  veiled  in  human 
form,"  said  the  pastor. 

Wilfrid,  in  his  own  room  again,  calmed  and  convinced, 
knew  not  how  to  contend  with  powers  so  divinely  majestic. 

Minna  said  to  herself — 

"  Why  will  he  not  allow  me  to  love  him?" 


V. 

THE    FAREWELL. 

There  is  in  man  a  phenomenon  which  is  the  despair  of  those 
reflective  minds  who  endeavor  to  find  some  meaning  in  the 
march  of  social  vicissitudes,  and  to  formulate  some  laws  of 
progress  for  the  movement  of  intellect.  However  serious  a 
fact  may  be,  or,  if  supernatural  facts  could  exist,  however 
magnificent  a  miracle  could  be,  publicly  performed,  the 
lightning  flash  of  the  fact,  the  thunderbolt  of  the  miracle 
would  be  lost  in  the  moral  ocean,  and  the  surface,  rippled  for 
an  instant  by  some  slight  ebullition,  would  at  once  resume 
the  level  of  its  ordinary  swell. 

Does  the  Voice,  to  be  more  surely  heeded,  pass  through  an 
animal's  jaws?  Does  the  Hand  write  in  strange  characters  on 
the  cornice  of  the  hall  where  the  Court  is  reveling?  Does 
the  Eye  light  up  the  King's  slumbers  ?  Does  the  Prophet  read 
the  dream  ?  Does  Death,  when  summoned,  stand  in  the  lumin- 
ous space  where  a  man's  faculties  revive?  Does  the  Spirit 
crush  matter  at  the  foot  of  the  mystical  ladder  of  the  seven 
spiritual  worlds  hung  one  above  another  in  space,  and  seen  by 
the  floods  of  light  that  fall  in  cascades  down  the  steps  of  the 
heavenly  floor?  Still,  however  deep  the  inner  revelation, 
however  distinct  the  outward  sign,  by  the  morrow  Balaam 
doubts  both  his  ass  and  himself;  Belshazzar  and  Pharaoh  call 
in  seers  to  explain  the  sign — Daniel  or  Moses. 

The  Spirit  descends,  snatches  a  man  above  the  earth,  opens 
the  seas  and  shows  him  the  bottom  of  them,  calls  up  vanished 
generations,  gives  life  to  the  dry  bones  thickly  strewn  in  the 
great  valley ;  the  Apostle  writes  the  Apocalypse  ;  and  twenty 
centuries  later  human  science  confirms  the  Apostle  and  trans- 
lates his  figures  of  speech  into  axioms.  What  difference  does 
it  make?  The  mass  of  people  live  to-day  as  they  lived 
(120) 


SERAPHITA.  121 

yesterday,  as  they  lived  in  the  first  Olympiad,  as  they  lived 
the  first  day  after  creation,  and  on  the  eve  of  the  great  cata- 
clysm. Doubt  drowns  everything  in  its  waters.  The  same 
waves  beat,  with  the  selfsame  ebb  and  flow,  on  the  human 
granite  that  hems  in  the  sea  of  intellect. 

Man  asks  himself  whether,  indeed,  he  saw  what  he  saw, 
whether  he  really  heard  the  words  that  were  spoken,  whether 
the  fact  was  a  fact,  and  the  idea  really  an  idea ;  and  then  he 
goes  on  his  way,  he  thinks  of  his  business,  he  obeys  the  in- 
evitable servitor  of  Death — Forget  fulness,  who  throws  his  black 
cloak  over  the  old  humanity  of  which  the  younger  has  no  re- 
membrance. Man  never  ceases  to  move,  to  go  on,  to  grow  as 
a  vegetable  grows,  till  the  day  when  the  axe  falls.  If  the 
flood-like  force,  this  mounting  pressure  of  bitter  waters,  hin- 
ders all  progress,  it  also,  no  doubt,  is  a  warning  of  death. 
None  but  the  loftier  spirits  open  to  faith  can  discern  Jacob's 
mystical  stair, 

After  listening  to  the  reply  in  which  Seraphita,  being  so 
urgently  questioned,  had  unrolled  the  divine  scroll,  as  an 
organ  fills  a  church  with  its  roar,  and  shows  the  power  of  the 
musical  universe  by  flooding  the  most  inaccessible  vaults  with 
its  solemn  notes,  playing,  like  light,  among  the  frail  wreaths 
of  the  capitals,  Wilfrid  went  home,  appalled  at  having  seen 
the  world  in  ruins,  and,  above  the  ruins  a  light  unknown, 
shed  by  the  hand  of  that  young  creature. 

On  the  following  day  he  was  still  thinking  of  it,  but  his 
terrors  were  allayed  ;  he  was  not  in  ruins,  nor  even  changed — 
his  passions  and  ideas  woke  up  fresh  and  vigorous. 

He  went  to  breakfast  with  the  minister,  and  found  him 
lost  in  the  study  of  Jean  Wier's  treatise,  which  he  had  been 
looking  through  that  morning  to  be  able  to  reassure  his  visitor. 
With  the  childlike  simplicity  of  a  sage,  the  pastor  had  turned 
down  the  leaves  at  some  pages  where  Jean  Wier  adduced 
authentic  evidence  demonstrating  the  possibility  of  such 
things  as  had  happened  the  day  before;  for  to  the  learned  an 


122  SERAPHITA. 

idea  is  an  event,  whereas  the  greatest  events  are  to  them 
hardly  an  idea. 

By  the  time  these  two  philosophers  had  swallowed  their 
fifth  cup  of  tea,  that  mystical  evening  seemed  quite  natural. 
The  heavenly  truths  were  more  or  less  substantial  arguments, 
and  open  to  discussion.  Seraphita  was  a  more  or  less  eloquent 
girl ;  allowance  must  be  made  for  her  exquisite  voice,  her 
enchanting  beauty,  her  fascinating  manner,  all  the  oratorical 
skill  by  which  an  actor  can  put  a  world  of  feelings  and  ideas 
into  a  sentence  which  in  itself  is  often  quite  commonplace. 

"  Pooh  !  "  said  the  good  minister,  with  a  little  philosophical 
grimace,  as  he  spread  a  slice  of  bread  with  salt  butter,  "the 
answer  to  all  these  riddles  is  six  feet  beneath  the  mold  !  " 

"At  the  same  time,"  said  Wilfrid,  sugaring  his  tea,  "  T  can- 
not understand  how  a  girl  of  sixteen  can  know  so  many  things ; 
for  she  squeezed  everything  into  her  speech  as  if  it  were  in  a 
vise." 

"But  only  read  the  story  of  the  Italian  girl  who,  at  twelve 
years  old,  could  speak  forty-two  languages,  ancient  and  mod- 
ern," said  the  pastor.  "And,  again,  that  of  the  monk  who 
read  thought  by  smell.  These  are  in  Jean  Wier,  and  in  a 
dozen  other  treatises  which  I  will  give  you  to  read,  a  thousand 
proofs  rather  than  one." 

"  I  daresay,  my  dear  pastor;  but  Seraphita  remains  to  me  a 
wife  it  would  be  divine  joy  to  possess." 

"  She  is  all  intellect,"  replied  the  minister  dubiously. 

Some  days  passed,  during  which  the  snow  in  the  valleys 
insensibly  melted  away ;  the  greenery  of  the  forests  peeped 
through  like  a  fresh  growth  ;  Norwegian  nature  made  itself 
beautiful  in  anticipation  of  its  brief  bridal  day.  All  this  time, 
though  the  milder  temperature  allowed  of  open-air  exercise, 
Seraphita  remained  in  solitary  seclusion.  Thus  Wilfrid's  pas- 
sion was  enhanced  by  the  aggravating  vicinity  of  the  girl  he 
loved,  and  who  refused  to  be  seen.  When  the  inscrutable 
being  admitted  Minna,  Minna  could  detect  the  symptoms  of 


SERAPHITA.  123 

an  inward  fever;  Seraphita's  voice  was  hollow,  and  her  com- 
plexion was  wan ;  whereas  hitherto  its  transparency  might 
have  been  compared  by  a  poet  to  that  of  the  diamond,  it  now 
had  the  sheen  of  the  topaz. 

"Have  you  seen  her?"  asked  Wilfrid,  who  had  prowled 
round  the  house,  awaiting  Minna's  return. 

"We  shall  lose  him  !  "  said  the  girl,  her  eyes  filling  with 
tears. 

"Do  not  try  to  fool  me  !  "  cried  the  stranger,  controlling 
the  vehemence  of  tone  that  expressed  his  fury.  "You  can 
only  love  Seraphita  as  one  girl  loves  another,  not  with  such 
love  as  I  feel  for  her.  You  cannot  conceive  what  peril  you 
would  be  in  if  there  were  anything  to  alarm  my  jealousy. 
Why  can  I  not  go  to  see  her  ?  Is  it  you  who  raise  difficul- 
ties?" 

"I  cannot  think,"  said  Minna,  calm  on  the  surface,  but 
quaking  with  mortal  terror,  "  what  right  you  have  to  sound 
the  depths  of  my  heart.  Yes,  I  love  him,"  she  went  on, 
summoning  the  courage  of  conviction  to  confess  the  faith  of 
her  soul.  "  But  my  jealousy,  though  natural  to  love,  fears  no- 
body here.  Alas  !  What  I  am  jealous  of  is  some  unconfessed 
feeling  in  which  he  is  absorbed.  Between  him  and  me  lies  a 
space  I  can  never  abridge.  I  want  to  know  whether  the  stars 
love  him  more  than  I,  whether  they  or  I  would  be  the  more 
eagerly  devoted  to  his  happiness  ?  Why,  why,  should  I  not 
be  free  to  declare  my  affection  ?  In  the  presence  of  death  we 
may  all  confess  our  attachment — and  Seraphitus  is  dying." 

"  Minna,  indeed  you  are  under  a  mistake  ;  the  siren  round 
whom  my  desires  have  so  often  hovered,  who  allows  me  to 
admire  her  as  she  reclines  on  her  couch,  so  graceful,  fragile, 
and  suffering,  is  not  a  man." 

"Nay,"  replied  Minna,  in  some  agitation,  "he  whose 
powerful  hand  guided  me  over  the  Falberg  to  the  safer  under 
the  shelter  of  the  Ice-Cap  up  there  " — and  she  pointed  to  the 
peak — "is  certainly  not  a  mere,  weak  jgirl.  If  you  had  but 


124  SERAPHITA. 

heard  her  prophesy !  Her  poetry  is  the  music  of  thought. 
No  young  girl  could  have  had  the  solemn  depth  of  voice 
which  stirred  my  soul." 

"What  certainty  have  you ?  "  Wilfrid  began. 

"  None  but  that  of  my  heart !  "  replied  Minna  in  confusion, 
and  hastily  interrupting  the  speaker. 

"Well,  but  I,"  cried  Wilfrid,  with  the  terrible  glance  of 
eagerness  and  desire  that  kills,  "  I,  who  know  what  the  extent 
of  her  power  is  over  me — I  will  prove  your  mistake." 

At  this  moment,  when  words  were  rushing  to  Wilfrid's 
tongue  as  vehemently  as  ideas  in  his  head,  he  saw  Seraphita 
come  out  of  the  Swedish  Castle,  followed  by  David.  The 
sight  of  her  soothed  his  effervescent  state. 

"  Look,"  said  he ;  "  none  but  a  woman  can  have  that  grace 
and  languor." 

"  He  is  ill ;  it  is  his  last  walk  !  "  said  Minna. 

At  a  sign  from  his  mistress,  David  left  her,  and  she  advanced 
toward  Wilfrid  and  Minna. 

"  Let  us  go  to  the  falls  of  the  Sieg,"  said  the  mysterious 
being ;  it  was  the  wish  of  a  sufferer  to  which  all  hasten  to 
accede. 

A  thin,  white  haze  hung  over  the  heights  and  dales  of  the 
fiord,  and  the  peaks,  glittering  like  stars,  pierced  above  it, 
giving  it  the  effect  of  a  milky-way  moving  onward.  Through 
this  earth-born  vapor  the  sun  was  visible  as  a  globe  of  red-hot 
iron.  In  spite  of  these  last  freaks  of  winter,  gusts  of  mild 
air,  bringing  the  scent  of  the  birch-trees,  already  covered  with 
their  yellow  flowers,  and  the  rich  perfume  exhaled  by  the 
larches,  whose  silky  tufts  were  all  displayed — breezes  warm 
with  the  incense  and  the  breathing  of  the  earth — testified  to 
the  exquisite  springtime  of  northern  lands,  the  brief  rapture 
of  a  most  melancholy  nature. 

The  wind  was  beginning  to  roll  away  the  veil  of  mist  that 
hardly  hid  the  view  of  the  gulf.  The  birds  were  singing. 

Where  the  sun  had  not  dried  off  the  frost  that  trickled 


SERAPHITA.  125 

down  the  road  in  murmuring  rills,  the  bark  of  the  trees  was 
pleasing  to  the  eye  by  its  fantastic  appearance. 

They  all  three  went  along  the  strand  in  silence.  Wilfrid 
and  Minna  were  lost  in  contemplation  of  the  magical  scene 
after  their  long  endurance  of  the  monotonous  winter  land- 
scape. Their  companion  was  pensive,  and  walked  as  though 
trying  to  distinguish  one  voice  in  the  concert.  They  reached 
the  rocks  between  which  the  Sieg  tumbles,  at  the  end  of  the 
long  avenue  of  ancient  fir-trees  which  the  torrent  had  cut  in 
meandering  through  the  forest,  a  path  covered  in  by  a  groined 
arch  of  boughs,  meeting  like  those  of  a  cathedral.  From 
thence  the  whole  of  the  fiord  was  seen,  and  the  sea  sparkled 
on  the  horizon  like  a  steel  blade.  At  this  instant  the  clouds 
vanished,  showing  the  blue  sky.  Down  in  the  hollows  and 
round  the  trees  the  air  was  full  of  floating  spangles,  the  dia- 
mond-dust swept  up  by  a  light  breeze,  and  dazzling  gems  of 
drops  were  hanging  at  the  tip  of  the  branches  of  each  pyramid. 
The  torrent  was  rolling  below ;  a  smoke  came  up  from  the 
surface,  tinted  in  the  sunshine  with  every  hue  of  light ;  its 
beams,  decomposed,  displayed  perfect  rainbows  of  the  seven 
colors,  like  the  play  of  a  thousand  prisms  meeting  and  cross- 
ing there.  This  wild  shore  was  curtained  with  various  kinds 
of  lichen,  a  rich  web,  sheeny  with  moisture,  like  some  gor- 
geous hanging  of  silk.  Heath,  already  in  blossom,  crowned 
the  rocks  with  flowers  in  skillful  disorder.  All  this  stirring 
foliage,  tempted  by  the  living  waters,  hung  their  heads  over 
it  like  hair ;  the  larches  waved  their  lace-like  arms,  as  if  caress- 
ing the  pines,  that  stood  rigid  like  careworn  old  men. 

This  luxuriant  display  was  a  contrast  to  the  solemnity  of 
the  antique  colonnades  of  the  forests,  range  upon  range  on 
the  hillsides,  and  to  the  broad  sheet  of  the  fiord,  in  which  the 
torrent  drowned  its  fury  at  the  feet  of  the  three  spectators. 
Beyond  it  all,  the  open  sea  closed  in  this  picture,  traced  by 
the  greatest  of  poets — Chance — to  which  we  owe  the  medley 
beauty  of  creation  when  left,  as  it  would  seem,  to  itself. 


126  SERAPHITA. 

Jarvis  was  a  speck  almost  lost  in  this  landscape,  in  this  im- 
mensity— sublime,  as  everything  is,  which,  having  but  a  brief 
existence,  offers  a  transient  image  of  perfection  ;  for  by  a  law, 
fatal  only  to  our  sight,  creations  that  appear  perfect,  the  de- 
light of  our  heart  and  of  our  eyes,  have  but  one  spring  to  live 
here. 

At  the  top  of  that  cliff  these  three  beings  might  easily  fancy 
themselves  alone  in  all  the  world. 

"How  exquisite  !  "  exclaimed  Wilfrid. 

"Nature  sings  its  hymns,"  said  Seraphita.  "Is  not  this 
music  delicious?  Confess  now,  Wilfrid,  no  woman  you  ever 
knew  could  create  for  herself  so  magnificent  a  retreat.  Here 
I  experience  a  feeling  that  the  sight  of  great  cities  rarely  in- 
spires, and  which  makes  me  long  to  remain  here,  lying  among 
these  grasses  of  such  rapid  growth.  Then,  with  my  eyes  on 
the  sky,  my  heart  laid  bare,  lost  in  the  sense  of  immensity,  I 
could  let  myself  listen  to  the  sighs  of  the  flower,  which, 
scarcely  released  from  its  primitive  nature,  would  fain  run 
about ;  and  to  the  cries  of  the  eider,  aggrieved  at  having  only 
wings,  while  I  thought  of  the  cravings  of  man,  who  has  some- 
thing of  everything,  and  who  also  is  for  ever  full  of  desires  j 
But  this,  Wilfrid,  is  a  woman's  poetic  fancy  !  You  can  find  a 
voluptuous  thought  in  that  hazy  expanse  of  water ;  in  those 
fantastic  veils,  behind  which  nature  plays  like  some  coquettish 
bride ;  and  in  this  atmosphere,  where  she  perfumes  her  green 
hair  for  her  bridal.  You  would  fain  see  the  form  of  a  naiad 
in  that  wreath  of  mist,  and  I,  as  you  think,  ought  to  hear  a 
manly  voice  in  the  torrent." 

"  And  is  not  love  in  it  all,  like  a  bee  in  a  flower?  "  replied 
Wilfrid,  who,  seeing  in  her  for  the  first  time  some  trace  of 
earthly  feeling,  thought  it  a  favorable  moment  for  the  expres- 
sion of  his  fervent  affection. 

"Always  the  same?"  said  Seraphita,  laughing,  Minna 
having  left  them  ;  the  girl  was  climbing  a  crag  where  she  had 
seen  some  blue  saxifrages. 


SERAPHITA.  127 

"Always!  "  exclaimed  Wilfrid.  "Listen,"  he  said,  with 
an  imperious  glance  that  met  a  panoply  of  adamant,  "  you 
know  not  who  I  am,  nor  what  my  power  is,  nor  what  I 
demand.  Do  not  reject  my  last  entreaty.  Be  mine,  for  the 
sake  of  the  world  within  your  heart !  Be  mine,  that  my  con- 
science may  be  pure,  that  a  heavenly  voice  may  sound  in  my 
ears  and  inspire  me  aright  in  the  undertaking  I  have  vowed 
to  carry  out,  impelled  by  my  hatred  of  the  nations,  but  to  be 
achieved  for  their  welfare  if  only  you  are  with  me.  What 
nobler  mission  can  a  woman  dream  of?  I  came  to  these 
lands  meditating  a  great  scheme." 

"  And  you  are  prepared  to  sacrifice  it  and  its  glories,"  said 
she,  "  to  a  very  simple  girl,  whom  you  will  love,  and  who  will 
guide  you  into  a  peaceful  path?" 

"  What  do  I  care?  I  only  want  you  !  This  is  my  secret," 
he  replied,  going  on  with  his  speech.  "  I  have  traveled  all 
over  the  North,  the  great  workshop  where  the  new  races  are 
produced  who  overspread  the  earth  like  floods  of  humanity 
sent  forth  to  renew  worn-out  civilization.  I  wanted  to  have 
begun  my  work  on  one  of  these  points,  conquering  there  the 
ascendency  that  force  and  intellect  can  assert  over  a  small 
race ;  to  have  trained  it  to  battle,  to  have  declared  war,  and 
have  sent  it  raging  like  a  conflagration  to  consume  Europe, 
while  shouting  to  these  '  Liberty  !  '  to  those  '  Plunder ! '  to 
some  '  Glory  !  '  to  others  '  Pleasure  ! '  I,  standing  meanwhile 
like  the  image  of  Fate,  pitiless  and  cruel,  moving  like  the 
storm  which  assimilates  from  the  atmosphere  the  atoms  of 
which  the  lightning  is  compounded,  and  feeding  on  men  like 
a  rapacious  monster.  I  should  then  have  conquered  Europe ; 
she  is  now  at  a  period  when  she  looks  for  the  coming  of  the 
new  Messiah,  who  is  to  devastate  the  world  and  to  re-form  the 
nations.  Europe  can  believe  in  no  one  but  Him  who  will 
trample  her  under  foot. 

"Some  day  historians  and  poets  would  have  justified  my 
existence,  have  magnified  me,  have  ascribed  great  ideas  to  me 


128  SERAPHITA. 

— to  me,  to  whom  this  huge  pleasantry,  written  in  blood,  is 
but  revenge. 

"But,  dear  Seraphita,  what  I  have  seen  has  disgusted  me 
with  the  North ;  force  here  is  too  blind,  and  I  crave  for  the 
Indies.  A  duel  with  a  selfish,  cowardly,  and  mercenary 
government  fascinates  me  more.  Beside,  it  is  easier  to  arouse 
the  imagination  of  the  races  that  dwell  at  the  foot  of  Cau- 
casus than  to  convince  the  minds  of  men  in  these  frozen 
lands.  I  am  tempted  to  cross  the  Russian  steppes,  to  reach 
the  frontiers  of  Asia,  to  cover  it  as  far  as  the  Ganges  with  my 
victorious  flood  of  human  beings,  and  then  I  shall  overthrow 
the  English  rule.  Seven  men,  at  different  periods,  have 
already  carried  out  such  a  scheme.  I  shall  renew  Art,  as  the 
Saracens  did  when  Mahomet  cast  them  over  Europe.  I  will 
not  be  so  sordid  a  king  as  those  who  now  govern  the  ancient 
provinces  of  the  Roman  Empire,  quarreling  with  their  sub- 
jects over  custom-house  dues.  No,  nothing  shall  arrest  the 
flash  of  my  gaze  or  the  storm  of  my  speech  !  My  feet,  like 
those  of  Genghis  Khan,  shall  cover  a  third  of  the  globe ;  my 
hand  shall  grasp  Asia  as  did  that  of  Aurung  Zeeb. 

"  Be  my  partner ;  take  your  seat,  fair  and  lovely  being,  on 
a  throne.  I  have  never  doubted  my  success,  but  with  you  to 
dwell  in  my  heart,  I  should  be  certain  of  it." 

"I  have  reigned  already,"  said  Seraphita. 

The  words  were  like  the  blow  dealt  by  the  axe  of  a  skillful 
woodsman  at  the  root  of  a  sapling,  felling  it  at  once.  Men 
alone  can  know  what  a  storm  a  woman  can  rouse  in  a  man's 
soul  when  he  has  been  trying  to  impress  her  with  his  strength 
or  his  power,  his  intellect  or  his  superiority,  and  the  capricious 
fair  nods  her  head  and  says,  "  Oh,  that  is  nothing  !  "  or  with 
a  bored  smile  observes,  "I  know  all  that,"  when  power  is  as 
naught  to  her. 

"What !  "  cried  Wilfrid  in  despair,  "the  riches  of  Art,  the 
wealth  of  the  world,  the  splendor  of  a  court " 

She  checked  him  by  a  mere  curl  of  her  lips,  and  said— 


SERAPHITA.  129 

"Beings  more  powerful  than  you  are  have  offered  me 
more." 

"Well,  have  you  no  soul,  then,  that  you  are  not  fascinated 
by  the  prospect  of  consoling  a  great  man  who  will  sacrifice 
everything  to  dwell  with  you  in  a  little  home  by  the  side  of  a 
lake?" 

"Why,"  said  she,  "I  am  loved  with  a  boundless  love." 

"By  whom?"  cried  Wilfrid,  going  toward  Seraphita  with 
a  frenzied  gesture,  as  if  to  fling  her  into  the  foaming  falls  of 
the  Sieg. 

She  looked  at  him  ;  his  arm  dropped  ;  and  she  pointed  to 
Minna,  who  came  running  down,  all  rose  and  white,  and  as 
pretty  as  the  flowers  she  carried  in  her  hand. 

"  My  child  !"  said  Seraph itus,  going  forward  to  meet  her. 

Wilfrid  stood  on  the  edge  of  the  cliff  as  motionless  as  a 
statue,  lost  in  thought,  longing  to  cast  himself  into  the  flow  of 
the  torrent,  like  one  of  the  fallen  trees  that  passed  under  his 
eyes  and  vanished  in  the  abyss  beneath. 

"  I  gathered  them  for  you,"  said  Minna,  giving  the  nosegay 
to  the  being  she  adored.  "  One  of  them — this  one,"  said  she, 
picking  out  a  particular  blossom,  "  is  like  the  flower  we  gath- 
ered on  the  Falberg." 

Seraphitus  looked  at  the  blossom  and  then  at  Minna. 

"  Why  do  you  question  me  thus?     Do  you  doubt  me  ?  " 

"  No,"  said  the  girl,  "  my  confidence  in  you  is  unbounded. 
While  you  are  far  more  beautiful  to  me  than  this  beautiful 
scenery,  you  also  seem  to  me  to  be  superior  in  intelligence  to 
all  the  rest  of  humanity.  When  I  have  been  with  you,  I  seem 
to  have  communed  with  God.  I  only  wish " 

"What?"  asked  Seraphitus,  with  a  flashing  look  that  re- 
vealed to  the  girl  the  vast  distance  that  divided  them. 

"  I  wish  I  could  suffer  in  your  stead." 

"  This  is  the  most  dangerous  of  Thy  creatures,"  thought 
Seraphitus.      "  Is  it  a  criminal  thought,  O  God,  to  long  to 
present  her  to  Thee?     Have  you  forgotten,"  he  said  aloud, 
9 


130  SERAPHITA 

"all  I  told  you  up  there?"  and  he  pointed  upward  to  the 
peak  of  the  Ice-Cap. 

"Now  he  is  terrible  again!"  thought  Minna  with  a 
shudder. 

The  roar  of  the  Sieg  formed  an  accompaniment  to  the 
thoughts  of  these  three  beings,  who  stood  together  for  a  few 
minutes  on  a  projecting  slab  of  rock,  parted,  as  they  were,  by 
immeasurable  gulfs  in  the  spiritual  world. 

"Teach  me  then,  Seraphitus,"  said  Minna  in  a  voice  as 
silvery  as  a  pearl  and  as  gentle  as  the  movements  of  a  sensitive 
plant.  "Teach  me  what  I  must  do  to  avoid  loving  you? 
Who  could  fail  to  admire  you  ?  And  love  is  the  admiration 
that  is  never  tired." 

"Poor  child!"  said  Seraphitus,  turning  pale,  "only  one 
Being  can  be  loved  thus." 

"Who  is  that?"  asked  Minna. 

"  You  shall  know  !  "  was  the  reply  in  the  weak  voice  of  one 
who  lies  down  to  die. 

"  Help  !     He  is  dying  !  "  cried  Minna. 

Wilfrid  hastened  forward,  and  seeing  this  being  reclining 
gracefully  on  a  block  of  gneiss  over  which  time  had  thrown  its 
carpet  of  velvet,  its  glistening  lichens,  and  dusky  mosses,  lus- 
trous in  the  sunshine — 

"  She  is  lovely  !  "  he  exclaimed. 

"This  is  the  last  glance  I  may  give  to  nature  in  travail," 
said  Seraphita,  collecting  all  her  strength  to  rise.  She  went 
to  the  edge  of  the  cliff,  whence  she  could  see  the  whole  of  the 
sublime  landscape,  but  lately  wrapped  in  its  mantle  of  snow, 
now  full  of  life,  green  and  flowery. 

"Farewell,"  said  she,  "oh,  burning  hot-bed  of  love! 
whence  everything  tends  from  the  centre  to  the  utmost  cir- 
cumference, while  the  extremities  are  gathered  up,  like  a 
woman's  hair,  to  be  spun  into  the  unknown  plait  by  which 
thou  art  linked,  in  the  invisible  ether,  to  the  Divine  Idea  ! 

"  Behold  him  who  is  bending  over  the  furrow,  watered  with 


SERAPHITA.  131 

his  sweat,  and  pausing  for  an  instant  to  look  up  to  heaven ; 
behold  her  who  gathers  the  children  in  to  feed  them  from  her 
breast ;  him  who  knots  the  ropes  in  the  fury  of  the  tempest ; 
her  who  sits  in  the  niche  of  a  rock  awaiting  her  father ;  and, 
again,  all  those  who  hold  out  their  hands  for  help  after  spend- 
ing their  life  in  thankless  toil !  Peace  and  courage  to  them 
all,  and  to  all  farewell ! 

"  Do  you  hear  the  cry  of  the  soldier  who  dies  unknown,  the 
wrath  of  the  man  who  laments,  disappointed,  in  the  desert  ? 
Peace  and  courage  to  all,  to  all  farewell !  Farewell,  you  who 
die  for  the  kings  of  the  earth;  but  farewell,  too,  ye  races 
without  a  native  land,  and  farewell,  lands  without  a  people — 
seeking  each  other.  Farewell,  above  all,  to  thee,  sublime 
exile,  who  knowest  not  where  to  lay  thy  head  !  Farewell, 
dear  innocents,  dragged  away  by  the  hair  of  your  head  for 
having  loved  too  well !  Farewell,  mothers  sitting  by  your 
dying  sons  !  Farewell,  holy,  broken-hearted  wives  !  Fare- 
well, O  ye  who  are  poor,  young,  weak,  and  suffering,  whose 
woes  I  have  so  often  made  my  own  !  Farewell,  all  ye  who 
gravitate,  groveling  in  the  sphere  of  instinct,  suffering  there 
for  others  ! 

"  Farewell,  ye  discoverers  who  seek  the  East  through  the 
thick  darkness  of  abstractions  as  grand  as  first  principles ;  and 
ye  martyrs  of  thought,  led  by  thought  to  the  true  light !  Fare- 
well, realms  of  inquiry,  where  I  can  hear  the  moans  of  insulted 
genius,  the  sigh  of  the  sage  to  whom  light  comes — too  late  ! 

"  I  perceive  the  angelic  harmonies,  the  wafted  fragrance, 
the  incense  from  the  heart  exhaled  by  those  who  move  on, 
praying,  comforting,  diffusing  divine  light  and  heavenly  balm 
to  sorrowing  souls.  Courage,  choir  of  Love !  to  whom  the 
nations  cry  :  '  Comfort  us  !  Protect  us  ! '  Courage,  and 
farewell ! 

"Farewell,  rock  of  granite,  thou  shalt  become  a  flower; 
farewell,  flower,  thou  shalt  be  a  dove;  farewell,  dove,  thou 
shalt  be  a  woman;  farewell,  woman,  thou  shalt  be  Suffering; 


132  SERAPHITA. 

farewell,  man,  thou  shalt  be  Belief;  farewell,  you,  who  shall 
be  all  love  and  prayer  !  " 

Exhausted  by  fatigue,  this  inexplicable  being  for  the  first 
time  leaned  on  Wilfrid  and  Minna  to  support  her  back  to  her 
house.  Wilfrid  and  Minna  felt  some  mysterious  contagion 
from  her  touch.  They  had  gone  but  a  few  steps  when  they 
met  David  in  tears. 

"  She  is  going  to  die  ;  why  have  you  brought  her  hither?  " 
he  exclaimed  in  a  far-off  voice. 

Seraphita  was  lifted  up  by  the  old  man,  who  had  recovered 
the  strength  of  youth,  and  he  flew  with  her  to  the  door  of  the 
Swedish  Castle,  like  an  eagle  carrying  some  white  lamb  to  his 
eyrie. 


VI. 

THE   ROAD    TO   HEAVEN. 

On  the  day  after  Seraphita  had  had  this  foretaste  of  her 
end,  and  had  bidden  farewell  to  the  earth,  as  a  prisoner  looks 
at  his  cell  before  quitting  it  for  ever,  she  was  suffering  such 
pain  as  compelled  her  to  remain  in  the  absolute  quietude 
of  those  who  endure  extreme  anguish.  Wilfrid  and  Minna 
went  to  see  her,  and  found  her  lying  on  her  couch  of  furs. 
Her  soul,  still  shrouded  in  the  flesh,  shone  through  the  veil, 
bleaching  it,  as  it  were,  from  day  to  day.  The  progress  made 
by  the  spirit  in  undermining  the  last  barrier  which  divided  it 
from  the  infinite  was  called  sickness;  the  hour  of  life  was 
named  death.  David  wept  to  see  his  mistress  suffering,  and 
refused  to  listen  to  her  consolations ;  the  old  man  was  as  un- 
reasonable as  a  child.  The  pastor  was  urgent  on  Seraphita  to 
take  some  remedies ;  but  all  was  in  vain. 

One  morning  she  asked  for  the  two  she  had  been  so  fond 
of,  telling  them  that  this  was  the  last  of  her  bad  days.  Wil- 
frid and  Minna  came  in  great  alarm ;  they  knew  that  they 
were  about  to  lose  her.  Seraphita  smiled  at  them,  as  those 
smile  who  are  departing  to  a  better  world ;  her  head  drooped 
like  a  flower  overweighted  with  dew,  which  opens  its  cup  for 
the  last  time  and  exhales  its  last  fragrance  to  the  air.  She 
looked  at  them  with  sadness,  of  which  they  were  the  cause ; 
she  had  ceased  to  think  of  herself,  and  they  felt  this  without 
being  able  to  express  their  grief,  mingled  as  it  was  with  grati- 
tude. 

Wilfrid  remained  standing,  silent  and  motionless,  lost  in 
such  contemplation  as  is  suggested  by  things  so  vast  that  they 
make  us  understand,  here  on  earth,  the  Supreme  Immensity. 
Minna,  emboldened  by  the  weakness  of  this  powerful  being, 

(133) 


134  SERAPHITA. 

or  perhaps  by  her  dread  of  losing  her  beloved  for  ever,  bent 
down  and  murmured,  "  Seraphitus — let  me  follow  you  !  " 

"  Can  I  hinder  you?  " 

"  But  why  do  you  not  love  me  enough  to  remain  here?" 

"I  could  not  love  anything  here." 

"What,  then,  do  you  love?" 

"Heaven." 

"  Are  you  worthy  of  heaven  if  you  thus  despise  God's 
creatures  here?" 

"  Minna,  can  we  love  two  beings  at  the  same  time?  Is  the 
Best-beloved  really  the  Best-beloved  if  He  does  not  fill  the 
whole  heart?  Ought  He  not  to  be  the  first  and  last  and  only 
One  ?  Does  not  she  who  is  all  love  quit  the  world  for  her 
Beloved  ?  Her  whole  family  becomes  but  a  memory ;  she  has 
but  one  relation — it  is  He  !  Her  soul  is  no  longer  her  own, 
but  His  !  If  she  keeps  anything  within  her  that  is  not  His, 
she  does  not  love;  no,  she  does  not  love!  Is  loving  half- 
heartedly loving  at  all  ?  The  voice  of  the  Beloved  makes  her 
all  glad  and  flows  through  her  veins  like  a  purple  tide,  redder 
than  the  blood ;  His  look  is  a  light  that  flashes  through  her, 
she  is  fused  with  Him  ;  where  He  is  all  is  beautiful.  He  is 
warmth  to  her  soul,  He  lights  everything;  near  Him,  is  it 
ever  cold  or  dark  to  her  ?  He  is  never  absent  ;  He  is  always 
within  us,  we  think  in  Him,  with  Him,  for  Him.  That, 
Minna,  is  how  I  love  Him." 

"  Whom  ?  "  said  Minna,  gripped  by  consuming  jealousy. 

"  God  !  "  replied  Seraphitus,  whose  voice  flashed  upon  their 
souls  like  a  beacon-light  of  freedom  blazing  from  hill  to  hill 
— "  God,  who  never  betrays  us  !  God,  who  does  not  desert 
us,  but  constantly  fulfills  our  desires,  and  who  alone  can  peren- 
nially satisfy  His  creatures  with  infinite  and  unmixed  joys  ! 
God,  who  is  never  weary,  and  who  only  has  smiles !  God, 
ever  new,  who  pours  His  treasures  into  the  soul,  who  purifies 
it  without  bitterness,  who  is  all  harmony,  all  flame  !  God,  who 
enters  into  us  to  blossom  there,  who  fulfills  all  our  aspirations, 


SERAPHITA.  135 

who  never  calls  us  to  account  if  we  are  His,  but  gives  Himself 
wholly,  ravishes  us,  and  expands  and  multiplies  us  in  Himself 
— God,  in  short ! 

"  Minna,  I  love  you  because  you  may  be  His  !  I  love  you 
because  if  you  come  to  Him  you  will  be  mine." 

"  Then  lead  me  to  Him,"  said  she,  kneeling  down.  "  Take 
me  by  the  hand  ;  I  will  leave  you  no  more." 

"Lead  us,  Seraphita,"  cried  Wilfred  vehemently,  coming 
forward  to  kneel  with  Minna.  "  Yes,  you  have  made  me 
thirst  for  the  Light  and  thirst  for  the  Word ;  I  thirst  with  the 
love  you  have  implanted  in  my  heart,  I  will  cherish  your  soul 
in  mine  ;  impart  your  Will,  and  I  will  do  whatsoever  you  bid 
me  do.  If  I  may  not  win  you,  I  will  treasure  every  feeling 
that  you  can  infuse  into  me  as  part  of  you  !  If  I  cannot  be 
united  to  you  but  by  my  strength  alone,  I  will  cling  as  flame 
clings  to  what  it  consumes.  Speak  !  " 

"Angel !  "  cried  the  incomprehensible  being,  with  a  look 
that  seemed  to  enfold  them  in  an  azure  mantle.  "Angel! 
heaven  is  thine  inheritance  !  " 

And  a  great  silence  fell  after  this  cry,  which  rang  in  the 
souls  of  Wilfrid  and  Minna  like  the  first  chord  of  some  celestial 
symphony. 

"  If  you  desire  to  train  your  feet  to  walk  in  the  way  that 
leads  to  heaven,  remember  that  the  first  steps  are  rough,"  said 
the  suffering  soul.  "God  must  be  sought  for  His  own  sake. 
In  that  sense  He  is  a  jealous  God,  He  will  have  you  altogether 
His;  but  when  you  have  given  yourself  to  Him,  He  never 
abandons  you.  I  will  leave  you  the  keys  of  the  kingdom 
where  His  light  shines,  where  you  will  everywhere  be  in  the 
bosom  of  the  Father,  in  the  heart  of  the  Bridegroom.  No 
sentinel  guards  the  gates;  you  can  enter  from  any  side ;  His 
palace,  His  treasures,  His  sceptre,  nothing  is  forbidden  ;  He 
says  to  all,  « Take  them  freely  ! '  But  you  must  will  to  go 
thither.  You  must  start  as  for  a  journey,  leave  your  home, 
give  up  your  plans,  bid  farewell  to  your  friends — father, 


136  SERAPHITA. 

mother,  sister,  even  the  infant  brother  that  cries — an  eternal 
farewell,  for  you  will  never  return,  any  more  than  martyrs 
bound  for  the  stake  returned  to  their  homes ;  you  must,  in 
short,  strip  yourself  of  the  feelings  and  possessions  to  which 
men  cling;  otherwise,  you  will  not  be  wholly  given  up  to 
your  enterprise. 

"  Do  for  God  what  you  would  have  done  for  your  ambitious 
schemes,  what  you  do  when  you  take  up  an  art,  what  you  did 
when  you  loved  a  creature  more  than  Him,  or  when  you  were 
studying  some  secret  of  human  knowledge.  Is  not  God 
Knowledge  itself,  Love  itself,  the  Font  of  all  poetry?  Is  not 
His  treasure  a  thing  to  covet?  His  treasure  is  inexhaustible, 
His  poetry  is  infinite,  His  love  unchangeable,  His  knowledge 
infallible  and  full  of  mysteries.  Cling  to  nothing,  then  ;  He 
will  give  you  All  !  Yes,  in  His  heart  you  will  find  possessions 
beyond  all  compare  with  those  you  leave  on  earth. 

"  What  I  tell  you  is  the  truth.  You  will  have  His  power, 
you  will  be  allowed  to  use  it  as  you  use  anything  that  belongs 
to  your  lover  or  your  mistress. 

"Alas  !  most  men  doubt,  lack  faith,  will,  and  perseverance. 
Though  some  set  out  on  the  road,  they  presently  look  back 
and  return.  Few  are  they  who  know  how  to  choose  between 
these  two  extremes — to  go  or  to 'stay;  heaven  or  the  muck- 
heap.  All  hesitate.  Weakness  leads  to  wandering,  passion 
to  evil  ways,  vice  as  a  habit  clogs  the  feet,  and  man  makes  no 
progress  toward  a  better  state. 

"  Every  being  passes  a  preliminary  life  in  the  Sphere  of  In- 
stinct, laboring  with  endless  toil  to  amass  earthly  treasures,  only 
to  recognize  their  futility  at  last.  But  how  many  times  must 
we  live  through  this  first  life  before  quitting  it  fit  to  begin  an- 
other stage  of  trial  in  the  Sphere  of  Abstractions,  where  the 
mind  is  exercised  in  false  science,  and  the  spirit  is  at  last  weary 
of  human  speech — for,  matter  being  exhausted,  the  spirit  pre- 
vails ?  How  many  forms  must  the  being  elect  of  heaven  wear 
out,  before  he  has  learned  the  preciousness  of  silence,  and  of 


SERAPHITA.  137 

the  solitude  whose  star-strewn  steppes  are  the  floor  of  the 
spiritual  world?  It  is  after  testing  and  trying  the  void  that 
his  eyes  turn  to  the  right  path.  Then  there  are  other  exist- 
ences to  be  worn  through  or  ever  he  may  reach  the  road  where 
the  Light  shines. 

"  Death  marks  a  stage  on  this  journey.  After  that,  his  expe- 
rience is  in  a  reversed  order ;  it  takes  a  whole  life,  perhaps,  to 
acquire  the  virtues  that  are  the  antithesis  of  the  errors  in  which 
he  has  previously  lived. 

"Thus,  first  we  live  the  life  of  suffering,  where  torments 
make  us  thirst  for  love.  Next  comes  the  life  of  loving,  where 
devotion  to  the  creature  teaches  us  devotion  to  the  Creator ; 
where  the  virtues  of  love,  its  thousand  sacrifices,  its  angelic 
hope,  its  joys  paid  for  by  grief,  its  patience  and  resignation, 
excite  an  .appetite  for  things  divine.  After  this  comes  the  life 
during  which  we  seek,  in  silence,  the  traces  of  the  Word,  and 
become  humble  and  charitable.  Then  the  life  of  high  desire ; 
finally,  the  life  of  prayer.  There  we  find  eternal  sunshine ; 
there  are  flowers,  there  is  fruition  ! 

"  The  qualities  we  acquire,  and  which  slowly  grow  up  in  us, 
are  the  invisible  bonds  binding  each  of  these  existences  to  the 
next ;  the  soul  alone  remembers  them,  since  matter  has  no 
memory  for  spiritual  things.  The  mind  alone  preserves  a  tra- 
dition of  former  states.  This  unbroken  legacy  of  the  past  to 
the  present,  and  of  the  present  to  the  future,  is  the  secret  of 
human  genius :  some  have  the  gift  of  form,  some  the  gift  of 
number,  some  the  gift  of  harmony ;  these  are  all  steps  in  the 
way  to  the  Light.  Yes,  whoever  possesses  one  of  these  gifts 
touches  the  infinite  at  one  spot. 

"  The  Word,  of  which  I  have  here  uttered  a  few  axioms,  has 
been  distributed  over  the  earth,  which  has  reduced  it  to  pow- 
der, and  infused  it  into  its  works,  its  doctrines,  its  poetry.  If 
the  tiniest  speck  of  it  shines  on  a  work,  you  say,  '  This  is 
great ;  this  is  true  ;  this  is  sublime  !  '  And  that  mere  atom 
vibrates  within  you,  giving  you  a  foretaste  of  heaven.  Thus, 


138  SERAPHITA. 

one  has  sickness,  to  divide  him  from  the  world  ;  another  has 
solitude,  bringing  him  near  to  God;  a  third  has  poetry;  in 
short,  everything  that  throws  you  in  on  yourself,  striking  you 
and  crushing  you,  is  a  ringing  call  from  the  Divine  Sphere. 

"  When  a  being  has  traced  the  first  furrow  straight,  it  is 
enough  to  make  the  others  by ;  one  single  profound  thought, 
a  voice  once  heard,  an  acute  pang,  a  single  echo  that  finds  the 
Word  in  you,  changes  your  soul  for  ever.  Every  road  leads 
to  God  ;  hence  you  have  many  chances  of  finding  Him  if  you 
walk  straight  on.  When  the  happy  day  dawns  that  finds  you 
with  your  foot  on  the  road,  starting  on  your  pilgrimage,  the 
earth  knows  no  more  of  you,  it  understands  you  no  more,  you 
are  no  longer  in  harmony  with  it,  it  rejects  you. 

"  Those  who  come  to  know  these  things,  and  who  speak  a 
few  utterances  of  the  true  Word,  find  not  where  to  lay  their 
head ;  they  are  hunted  like  wild  beasts,  and  often  perish  on 
the  scaffold  amid  the  rejoicing  of  the  assembled  populace ;  but 
angels  open  the  gates  of  heaven  to  them.  So  your  destination 
is  a  secret  between  God  and  you,  as  love  is  a  secret  between 
two  hearts.  You  are  as  the  hidden  treasure  over  which  men 
trample,  greedy  for  gold,  but  not  knowing  that  it  is  there. 

"  Your  life  is  one  of  incessant  activity.  Each  act  has  a  pur- 
pose that  tends  to  God,  just  as,  when  you  love,  your  acts  and 
thoughts  are  full  of  the  creature  you  love ;  but  love  and  its 
joys,  love  and  its  sensual  pleasures,  is  but  an  imperfect  image 
of  the  infinite  love  that  unites  you  to  the  Celestial  Bridegroom. 
Every  earthly  joy  is  succeeded  by  anguish  and  dissatisfaction  ; 
for  love  to  bring  no  disgust  in  its  train,  death  must  quench  it 
at  the  fiercest,  or  ever  you  see  the  ashes ;  but  God  transforms 
our  miseries  into  raptures,  joy  is  multiplied  by  itself,  it  con- 
stantly increases,  and  knows  no  bounds. 

"Thus,  in  the  earthly  life,  a  transient  love  is  ended  by  en- 
during tribulations ;  whereas,  in  the  spiritual  life,  the  tribula- 
tions of  a  day  end  in  infinite  joys.  Your  soul  is  for  ever  glad. 
You  feel  God  close  to  you,  in  you  ;  He  gives  a  flavor  of  holi- 


SERAPHITA.  139 

ness  to  all  things,  He  shines  in  your  soul,  He  seals  you  with 
His  sweetness,  He  weans  you  from  the  earth  for  your  own 
sake,  and  makes  you  care  for  it  for  His  sake  by  suffering  you  to 
use  His  power.  You  do,  in  His  name,  the  works  He  inspires 
you  to  do  ;  you  wipe  away  tears ;  you  act  for  Him  ;  you  have 
nothing  of  your  own ;  like  Him,  you  love  all  creatures  with 
inextinguishable  love;  you  long  to  see  them  all  marching 
toward  Him,  as  a  truly  loving  woman  would  fain  see  all  the 
nations  of  the  earth  obedient  to  her  well-beloved. 

"The  last  life — that  in  which  all  previous  lives  are  summed 
up — is  the  life  of  prayer;  in  it  every  power  is  strung  to  the 
highest  pitch,  and  its  merits  will  open  the  gates  of  heaven  to 
the  being  made  perfect.  Who  can  make  you  understand  the 
greatness,  the  majesty,  the  power  of  prayer?  Oh  that  my 
voice  may  be  as  thunder  in  your  hearts,  and  that  it  may 
change  them  !  Be  now,  forthwith,  what  you  will  become 
after  trials.  There  are  certain  privileged  beings — prophets, 
seers,  evangelists,  martyrs,  all  who  suffer  for  the  Word  or  who 
have  declared  it — these  souls  cross  the  human  spheres  at  a 
single  bound,  and  rise  at  once  to  prayer.  So,  too,  do  those 
who  are  consumed  by  the  flame  of  faith.  Be  ye  then  such  a 
daring  pair  !  God  accepts  such  temerity ;  He  loves  those 
who  take  Him  with  violence,  He  never  rejects  such  as  can 
force  their  way  to  Him.  Understand  this:  Desire,  the 
torrent  of  will,  is  so  potent  in  a  man  that  a  single  jet  forci- 
bly emitted  is  enough  to  win  anything,  a  single  cry  is  often 
enough  when  uttered  under  the  stress  of  faith.  Be  ye  one  of 
those  beings,  full  of  force,  will,  and  love  !  Be  victorious  over 
the  earth  !  Let  the  hunger  and  thirst  for  God  possess  you 
wholly ;  run  to  Him  as  the  thirsting  hart  runs  to  the  water- 
brook.  Desire  will  give  you  wings ;  tears,  the  flowers  of 
repentance,  will  fall  like  a  heavenly  baptism,  whence  your 
nature  will  come  forth  purified.  From  the  bosom  of  these 
waters  leap  into  prayer  ! 

"  Silence  and  meditation  are  efficacious  means  of  entering 


140  SERAPHITA. 

on  this  road  ;  God  always  reveals  Himself  to  the  solitary  and 
contemplative  man.  By  this  method  the  necessary  separation 
is  effected  between  matter,  which  has  so  long  held  you 
shrouded  in  darkness,  and  the  spirit,  which  is  born  in  you 
and  gives  you  light,  and  day  will  dawn  in  your  soul.  Your 
broken  heart  receives  the  light  which  floods  it ;  you  no  lon- 
ger feel  convictions,  but  dazzling  certainties.  The  poet  has 
expression,  the  sage  meditates,  the  righteous  man  acts ;  but  he 
who  is  on  the  frontier  of  the  divine  worlds  prays,  and  his 
prayer  is  expression,  meditation,  and  action  all  in  one  !  Yes, 
his  prayer  contains  everything,  includes  everything ;  it  com- 
pletes your  nature  by  showing  you  the  Spirit  and  the  Way. 

"  Prayer  is  the  fair  and  radiant  daughter  of  all  the  human 
virtues,  the  arch  connecting  heaven  and  earth,  the  sweet 
companion  that  is  alike  the  lion  and  the  dove  ;  and  prayer 
will  give  you  the  key  of  heaven.  As  pure  and  as  bold  as 
innocence,  as  strong  as  all  things  are  that  are  entire  and 
single,  this  fair  and  invincible  queen  rests  on  the  material 
world ;  she  has  ta'ken  possession  of  it ;  for,  like  the  sun,  she 
casts  about  it  a  sphere  of  light.  The  universe  belongs  to  him 
who  will,  who  can,  who  knows  how  to  pray ;  but  he  must  will, 
he  must  be  able,  and  he  must  know  how — in  one  word,  he 
must  have  power,  faith,  and  wisdom.  And,  indeed,  when 
prayer  is  the  outcome  of  so  many  trials,  it  is  the  consum- 
mation of  all  truth,  of  all  power,  of  all  emotion.  The  off- 
spring of  the  laborious,  slow,  and  persistent  development  of 
every  natural  property,  and  alive  by  the  divine  insufflation  of 
the  Word,  she  has  enchantments  in  her  hand,  she  is  the  crown 
of  worship — neither  material  worship  of  images,  nor  spiritual 
worship,  which  has  its  formulas,  but  worship  of  the  divine 
order. 

"  We  do  not  then  say  prayers  ;  prayer  lights  up  within  us, 
and  is  a  faculty  which  acts  of  itself;  it  acquires  the  vital 
activity  which  lifts  it  above  all  forms  ;  it  links  the  soul  to  God, 
and  you  are  joined  to  Him  as  the  root  of  a  tree  is  joined  to  the 


SERAPHITA,  141 

earth ;  the  elements  of  things  flow  in  your  veins,  and  you  live 
the  life  of  the  worlds  themselves.  Prayer  bestows  external 
conviction  by  enabling  you  to  penetrate  the  world  of  matter 
through  a  cohesion  of  all  your  faculties  with  elementary  sub- 
stances; it  bestows  internal  conviction  by  evolving  your  very 
essence,  and  mingling  it  with  that  of  the  spiritual  spheres. 

"  To  pray  thus  you  must  attain  to  absolute  freedom  from 
the  flesh ;  you  must  be  refined  in  the  furnace  to  the  purity  of 
a  diamond;  for  that  perfect  communion  can  only  be  achieved 
by  absolute  quiescence,  the  stilling  of  every  storm.  Yes, 
prayer,  literally  an  aspiration  of  the  soul  set  wholly  free  from 
the  body,  bears  up  every  power,  applying  them  all  to  the  con- 
stant and  persistent  union  of  the  visible  and  the  invisible. 
When  you  possess  the  gift  of  praying  without  weariness,  with 
love,  assurance,  force,  and  intelligence,  your  spiritualized 
nature  soon  attains  to  power.  It  passes  beyond  everything, 
like  the  whirlwind  or  the  thunder,  and  partakes  of  the  nature 
of  God.  You  acquire  alacrity  of  spirit ;  in  one  instant  you 
can  be  present  in  every  region ;  you  are  borne,  like  the  Word 
itself,  from  one  end  of  the  world  to  the  other.  There  is  a 
harmony — you  join  in  it ;  there  is  a  light — you  see  it ;  there 
is  a  melody — its  echo  is  in  you.  In  that  frame  you  will  feel 
your  intellect  expanding,  growing,  and  its  insight  reaching  to 
prodigious  distances ;  in  fact,  to  the  spirit,  time  and  space 
are  not.  Distance  and  duration  are  proportions  proper  to 
matter ;  and  spirit  and  matter  have  nothing  in  common. 

''Although  these  things  proceed  in  silence  and  stillness, 
without  disturbance  or  external  motion,  everything  is  action 
in  prayer;  but  vital  action,  devoid  of  all  substantiality,  refined 
like  the  motion  of  worlds  into  a  pure  and  invisible  force.  It 
comes  down  from  above  like  light,  and  gives  life  to  the  souls 
that  lie  in  its  rays,  as  nature  lies  in  those  of  the  sun.  It 
everywhere  resuscitates  virtue,  purifies  and  sanctifies  action, 
peoples  the  solitude,  and  gives  a  foretaste  of  eternal  bliss. 
When  once  you  hare  known  the  ecstasy  of  the  divine  trans- 


142  SERAPHITA. 

port  that  comes  of  your  internal  struggles,  there  is  no  more  to 
be  said ;  when  once  you  have  grasped  the  sistrum  on  which 
to  praise  God,  you  will  never  lay  it  down.  Hence  the  isola- 
tion in  which  angelic  spirits  dwell  and  their  scorn  of  all  that 
constitutes  human  joys. 

"I  say  unto  you,  they  are  cut  off  from  the  number  of  those 
who  must  die  ;  if  they  understand  their  speech,  they  no  longer 
understand  their  ideas ;  they  are  amazed  by  their  doings,  by 
what  is  termed  politics,  by  earthly  laws  and  communities ;  to 
them  there  are  no  mysteries,  nothing  but  truth.  Those  who 
have  attained  the  degree  at  which  their  eyes  can  discern  the 
gates  of  heaven,  and  who,  without  casting  a  single  glance 
behind,  without  expressing  a  single  regret,  can  look  down 
upon  the  worlds  and  read  their  destinies — those,  I  say,  are 
silent,  and  wait  and  endure  the  last  conflicts;  the  last  is  the 
hardest,  resignation  is  the  supreme  virtue.  To  dwell  in  exile 
and  make  no  complaint,  to  have  no  care  for  things  on  earth 
and  yet  to  smile,  to  belong  to  God  and  be  left  among  men  ! 

"  Do  you  not  plainly  hear  the  voice  that  cries  to  you,  '  On ! 
on  !  '  Often  in  a  celestial  vision  the  angels  descend  and  wrap 
you  in  song.  Then  you  must  see  them  soar  back  to  the  hive 
without  a  tear,  without  a  murmur.  To  murmur  would  be  to 
fail.  Resignation  is  the  fruit  that  ripens  at  the  gate  of  heaven. 
How  impressive  and  beautiful  are  the  calm  smile,  the  unruffled 
brow  of  the  resigned  creature  !  How  radiant  the  light  that 
adorns  his  face  !  Those  who  come  within  his  range  grow 
better;  his  look  is  penetrating  and  pathetic.  He  triumphs 
merely  by  his  presence,  more  eloquent  in  his  silence  than  the 
prophet  in  his  speech.  He  stands  alert  like  a  faithful  dog 
listening  for  his  master. 

"  Stronger  than  love,  more  eager  than  hope,  greater  than 
faith,  Resignation  is  the  adorable  maiden  who,  prone  on  the 
earth,  clings  for  an  instant  to  the  palm  she  has  won  by  leaving 
the  print  of  her  pure  white  feet ;  and  when  she  is  no  more, 
men  come  in  crowds  and  say,  '  Behold  ! '  God  preserves  her 


SERAPHITA.  143 

there  as  an  image,  and  at  her  feet  creep  all  the  shapes  and 
species  of  animal  life  seeking  their  way.  Now  and  again  she 
shakes  and  sheds  the  light  that  emanates  from  her  hair,  and 
we  see;  she  speaks,  and  we  listen ;  and  all  say  to  one  another, 
'A  miracle  i  ' 

"  Often  she  triumphs  in  the  name  of  God ;  men  in  their 
terror  deny  her  and  put  her  to  death ;  she  lays  down  her 
sword  and  smiles  at  the  stake  after  saving  the  nations ! 

"  How  many  pardoned  angels  have  stepped  from  martyrdom 
to  heaven  !  Sinai  and  Golgotha  are  not  here  nor  there.  The 
angel  is  crucified  everywhere,  and  in  every  sphere.  Sighs  go 
up  to  God  from  every  world.  The  earth  on  which  we  live  is 
one  ear  of  the  harvest ;  humanity  is  but  a  species  in  the  vast 
field  where  flowers  are  grown  for  heaven. 

"  In  short,  God  is  everywhere  the  same,  and  it  is  easy 
everywhere  to  go  up  to  Him  by  prayer." 

After  these  words,  falling  as  from  the  lips  of  a  second 
Hagar  in  the  desert,  and  stirring  the  souls  they  pierced  like 
the  spears  shot  by  the  fiery  word  of  Isaiah,  the  Being  was 
silent  to  collect  some  little  remaining  strength.  Neither 
Wilfrid  nor  Minna  dared  to  speak.  Then  on  a  sudden  HE 
sat  up  to  die. 

"  Soul  of  the  universe,  oh  God,  whom  I  love  for  Thyself! 
Thou,  Judge  and  Father,  gauge  a  fervor  that  knows  no  limit 
but  Thine  infinite  goodness  !  Impart  to  me  Thine  essence 
and  Thy  faculties,  that  I  may  be  more  truly  Thine !  Take 
me,  that  I  may  no  longer  be  my  own.  If  I  am  not  duly  puri- 
fied, cast  me  back  into  the  furnace.  If  I  am  not  finely 
moulded;  let  me  be  made  into  some  useful  ploughshare  or 
victorious  sword.  Grant  me  some  glorious  martyrdom  to 
proclaim  Thy  word.  Even  if  Thou  reject  me,  I  will  bless 
Thy  justice.  If  my  exceeding  love  may  win  in  a  moment  what 
hard, and  patient  labor  may  not  obtain,  snatch  me  up  in  Thy 
chariot  of  fire  !  Whether  Thou  shalt  grant  me  to  triumph  or 
to  suffer  again,  blessed  be  Thou  !  But  if  I  surfer  for  Thee,  is 


144  SERAPHITA. 

not  that  a  triumph?  Take  me — seize,  snatch,  drag  me  away  ! 
Or,  if  Thou  wilt,  reject  me  !  Thou  art  He  whom  I  worship, 
and  who  can  do  no  wrong.  Ah!"  he  cried  after  a  pause, 
"the  bonds  are  breaking.  Pure  spirits,  holy  throng,  come 
forth  from  the  depths,  fly  over  the  surface  of  the  luminous 
flood  !  The  hour  has  struck ;  come,  gather  round  me.  We 
will  sing  at  the  gates  of  the  sanctuary,  our  chants  shall  dis- 
perse the  last  lingering  clouds.  We  will  unite  to  hail  the 
morn  of  everlasting  day.  Behold  the  dawn  of  the  true 
Light !  Why  cannot  I  take  my  friends  with  me  ?  Farewell, 
poor  earth,  farewell !  " 


VII. 

THE  ASSUMPTION. 

This  last  hymn  was  not  uttered  in  words,  nor  expressed  by 
gestures,  nor  by  any  of  the  signs  which  serve  men  as  a  means 
of  communicating  their  thoughts,  but  as  the  soul  speaks  to 
itself;  for,  at  the  moment  when  Seraphita  was  revealed  in  her 
true  nature,  her  ideas  were  no  longer  enslaved  to  human 
language.  The  vehemence  of  her  last  prayer  had  broken  the 
bonds.  Like  a  white  dove,  the  soul  hovered  for  a  moment 
above  this  body,  of  which  the  exhausted  materials  were  about 
to  dissever. 

The  aspiration  of  this  soul  to  heaven  was  so  infectious  that 
Wilfrid  and  Minna  failed  to  discern  death  as  they  saw  the 
radiant  spark  of  life. 

They  had  fallen  on  their  knees  when  Seraphitus  had  turned 
to  the  dawn,  and  they  were  inspired  by  his  ecstasy. 

The  fear  of  the  Lord,  who  creates  man  anew  and  purges 
him  of  his  dross,  consumed  their  hearts.  Their  eyes  were 
closed  to  the  things  of  the  earth,  and  opened  to  the  glories  of 
heaven. 

Though  surprised  by  the  trembling  before  God  which  over- 
came some  of  those  seers  known  to  men  as  prophets,  they  still 
trembled,  like  them,  when  they  found  themselves  within  the 
circle  where  the  glory  of  the  Spirit  was  shining. 

Then  the  veil  of  the  flesh,  which  had  hitherto  hidden  him 
from  them,  insensibly  faded  away,  revealing  the  divine  sub- 
stance: They  were  left  in  the  twilight  of  the  dawn,  whose 
pale  light  prepared  them  to  see  the  true  light,  and  to  hear  the 
living  word  without  dying  of  it. 

In  this  condition  they  both  began  to  understand  the  im- 
measurable distances  that  divide  the  things  of  earth  from  the 
things  of  heaven. 

10  (145) 


146  SERAPHITA. 

The  life  on  whose  brink  they  stood,  trembling  and  dazzled 
in  a  close  embrace,  as  two  children  take  refuge  side  by  side  to 
gaze  at  a  conflagration — that  Life  gave  no  hold  to  the  senses. 
The  Spirit  was  above  them ;  it  shed  fragrance  without  odor, 
and  melody  without  the  help  of  sound;  here,  where  they 
knelt,  there  were  neither  surfaces,  nor  angles,  nor  atmosphere. 
They  dared  no  longer  question  him  nor  gaze  on  him,  but  re- 
mained under  his  shadow,  as  under  the  burning  rays  of  the 
tropical  sun  we  dare  not  raise  our  eyes  for  fear  of  being 
blinded. 

They  felt  themselves  near  to  him,  though  they  could  not 
tell  by  what  means  they  thus  found  themselves,  as  in  a  dream, 
on  the  border-line  of  the  visible  and  the  invisible,  nor  how 
they  had  ceased  to  see  the  visible  and  perceived  the  invisible. 

They  said  to  themselves,  "If  he  should  touch  us,  we  shall 
die!  "  But  the  Spirit  was  in  the  infinite,  and  they  did  not 
know  that  in  the  infinite  time  and  space  are  not,  that  they 
were  divided  from  him  by  gulfs,  though  apparently  so  near. 
Their  souls  not  being  prepared  to  receive  a  complete  knowl- 
edge of  the  faculties  of  that  life,  they  only  perceived  it  darkly, 
apprehending  it  according  to  their  weakness. 

Otherwise,  when  the  Living  Word  rang  forth,  of  which  the 
distant  sound  fell  on  their  ear,  its  meaning  entered  into  their 
soul  as  life  enters  into  a  body,  a  single  tone  of  that  Word 
would  have  swept  them  away,  as  a  whirl  of  fire  seizes  a  straw. 

Thus  they  beheld  only  what  their  nature,  upheld  by  the 
power  of  the  Spirit,  allowed  them  to  see ;  they  heard  only  so 
much  as  they  were  able  to  hear. 

Still,  in  spite  of  these  mitigations,  they  shuddered  as  they 
heard  the  voice  of  the  suffering  soul,  the  hymn  of  the  spirit 
awaiting  life,  and  crying  out  for  it.  That  cry  froze  the  very 
marrow  in  their  bones. 

The  Spirit  knocked  at  the  sacred  gate. 

"What  wilt  thou?"  asked  a  choir,  whose  voice  rang 
through  all  the  worlds. 


SERAPHITA.  147 

"To  go  to  God." 

"  Hast  thou  conquered  ?  " 

"I  have  conquered  the  flesh  by  abstinence;  I  have  van- 
quished false  speech  by  silence;  I  have  vanquished  false 
knowledge  by  humility;  I  have  vanquished  pride  by  charity; 
I  have  vanquished  the  earth  by  love;  I  have  paid  my  tribute 
of  suffering ;  I  am  purified  by  the  fires  of  faith  ;  I  have  striven 
for  life  by  prayer;  I  wait  in  adoration,  and  I  am  resigned." 

But  no  reply  came. 

"The  Lord  be  praised!"  said  the  Spirit,  believing  him- 
self rejected.  His  tears  flowed,  and  fell  in  dew  on  the  kneel- 
ing witnesses,  who  shuddered  at  the  judgments  of  God. 

On  a  sudden,  the  trumpets  sounded  for  the  victory  of  the 
Angel  in  this  last  test ;  their  music  filled  space,  like  a  sound 
met  by  an  echo ;  it  rang  through  it,  making  the  universe 
tremble.  Wilfrid  and  Minna  felt  the  world  shrink  under 
their  feet.  They  shivered,  shaken  by  the  terrors  of  appre- 
hending the  mystery  that  was  to  be  accomplished. 

There  was,  in  fact,  a  vast  stir,  as  though  the  eternal  legions 
were  forming  to  march,  and  gathering  in  spiral  order.  The 
worlds  spun  round,  like  clouds  swept  away  by  a  mad  whirl- 
wind. It  was  all  in  a  moment.  The  veils  were  rent ;  they 
saw  far  above  them,  as  it  were,  a  star  immeasurably  brighter 
than  the  brightest  star  in  the  skies ;  it  fell  from  its  place  like 
a  thunderbolt,  still  flashing  like  the  lightning,  paling  in  its 
flight  all  that  they  had  ever  hitherto  thought  to  be  light. 
»  This  was  the  messenger  bearing  the  good-tidings,  and  the 
plume  in  his  helmet  was  a  flame  of  life.  He  left  behind  him 
a  wake,  filled  up  at  once  by  the  waves  of  the  luminous  flood 
he  passed  through. 

He  bore  a  palm  and  a  sword ;  with  the  palm  he  touched  the 
Spirit,  and  it  was  transfigured ;  its  white  wings  spread  without 
a  sound. 

At  the  communication  of  the  Light,  which  changed  the 
Spirit  into  a  seraph,  the  garb  of  heavenly  armor  that  clothed 


148  SERAPHITA. 

its  glorious  form,  shed  such  radiance  that  the  two  seers  were 
blinded.  And,  like  the  three  apostles  to  whose  sight  Jesus 
appeared,  Wilfrid  and  Minna  were  conscious  of  the  burden  of 
their  bodies,  which  hindered  them  from  complete  and  un- 
clouded intuition  of  the  Word  and  the  True  Life. 

They  saw  the  nakedness  of  their  souls,  and  could  measure 
their  lack  of  brightness  by  comparison  with  the  halo  of  the 
seraph,  in  which  they  stood  as  a  shameful  spot.  They  felt  an 
ardent  desire  to  rush  back  into  the  mire  of  the  universe,  to 
endure  trial  there,  so  as  to  be  able  some  clay  to  utter  at  the 
sacred  gate  the  answer  spoken  by  the  glorified  Spirit. 

That  seraph  knelt  down  at  the  gate  of  the  sanctuary,  which 
he  could  at  last  see  face  to  face,  and  said,  pointing  to  them — 

"  Grant  them  to  see  more  clearly.  They  will  love  the 
Lord,  and  proclaim  His  Word." 

In  answer  to  this  prayer,  a  veil  fell.  Whether  the  unknown 
power  that  laid  a  hand  on  the  two  seers  did  for  a  moment 
annihilate  their  physical  bodies,  or  whether  it  released  their 
spirit  to  soar  free,  they  were  aware  of  a  separation  in  them- 
selves of  the  pure  from  the  impure. 

Then  the  seraph's  tears  rose  round  them  in  the  form  of  a 
vapor  which  hid  the  lower  worlds  from  their  eyes,  and  wrapped 
them  round  and  carried  them  away,  and  gave  them  oblivion 
of  earthly  meanings,  and  the  power  of  understanding  the  sense 
of  divine  things.  The  True  Light  appeared  ;  it  shed  light  on 
all  creation,  which,  to  them,  looked  barren  indeed  when  they 
saw  the  source  whence  the  worlds — earthly,  spiritual,  and 
divine — derive  motion. 

Each  world  had  a  centre  to  which  tended  every  atom  of  the 
sphere ;  these  worlds  were  themselves  each  an  atom  tending 
to  the  centre  of  their  species.  Each  species  had  its  centre  in 
the  vast  celestial  region  that  is  in  communion  with  the  inex- 
haustible and  flaming  motor  power  of  all  that  exists.  Thus, 
from  the  most  vast  to  the  smallest  of  the  worlds,  and  from 
the  smallest  sphere  to  the  minutest  atom  of  the  creation  that 


SERAPHITA.  149 

constitutes  it,  each  thing  was  an  individual,  and  yet  all  was 
one. 

What,  then,  was  the  purpose  of  the  Being,  immutable  in 
Essence  and  Faculty,  but  able  to  communicate  them  without 
loss,  able  to  manifest  them  as  phenomena  without  separating 
them  from  Himself,  and  causing  everything  outside  Himself 
to  be  a  creation  immutable  in  its  essence  and  mutable  in  its 
form  ?  The  two  guests  bidden  to  this  high  festival  could  only 
see  the  order  and  arrangement  of  beings,  and  wonder  at  their 
immediate  ends.  None  but  angels  could  go  beyond  that,  and 
know  the  means  and  understand  the  purpose. 

But  that  which  those  two  chosen  ones  could  contemplate, 
and  of  which  they  carried  away  the  evidence  to  be  a  light  to 
their  souls  for  ever  after,  was  the  certainty  of  the  action  of 
worlds  and  beings,  and  a  knowledge  of  the  effort  with  which 
they  all  tend  to  a  final  result.  They  heard  the  various  parts 
of  the  infinite  forming  a  living  melody;  and  at  each  beat, 
when  the  concord  made  itself  felt  as  a  deep  expiration,  the 
worlds,  carried  on  by  this  unanimous  motion,  bowed  to  the 
Omnipotent  One,  who  in  His  unapproachable  centre  made  all 
things  issue  from  Him  and  return  to  Him.  This  ceaseless 
alternation  of  voices  and  silence  seemed  to  be  the  rhythm  of 
the  holy  hymn  that  was  echoed  and  sustained  from  age  to  age. 

Wilfrid  and  Minna  now  understood  some  of  the  mysterious 
words  of  the  being  who  on  earth  had  appeared  to  them  under 
the  form  which  was  intelligible  to  each — Seraphitus  to  one, 
Seraphita  to  the  other — seeing  that  here  all  was  homogeneous. 
Light  gave  birth  to  melody,  and  melody  to  light ;  colors  were 
both  light  and  melody;  motion  was  number  endowed  by  the 
Word ;  in  short,  everything  was  at  once  sonorous,  diaphanous, 
and  mobile ;  so  that,  everything  existing  in  everything  else, 
extension  knew  no  limits,  and  the  angels  could  traverse  it 
everywhere  to  the  utmost  depths  of  the  infinite. 

They  saw  then  how  puerile  were  the  human  sciences  of 
which  they  had  heard.  Before  them  lay  a  view  without  any 


150  SERAPHITA. 

horizon,  an  abyss  into  which  ardent  craving  invited  them  to 
plunge ;  but  burdened  with  their  hapless  bodies,  they  had  the 
desire  without  the  power. 

The  seraph  lightly  spread  his  wings  to  take  his  flight,  and 
did  not  look  back  at  them — he  had  nothing  now  in  common 
with  the  earth. 

He  sprang  upward ;  the  vast  span  of  his  dazzling  pinions 
covered  the  two  seers  like  a  beneficent  shade,  allowing  them  ' 
to  raise  their  eyes  and  see  him  borne  away  in  his  glory  escorted 
by  the  rejoicing  archangel.  He  mounted  like  a  beaming  sun 
rising  from  the  bosom  of  the  waters;  but,  more  happy  he 
than  the  day-star  and  destined  to  more  glorious  ends,  he 
was  not  bound,  like  inferior  creatures,  to  a  circular  orbit; 
he  followed  the  direct  line  of  the  infinite,  tending  undevia- 
tingly  to  the  central  one,  to  be  lost  there  in  life  eternal,  and 
to  absorb  into  his  faculties  and  into  his  essence  the  power  of 
rejoicing  through  love  and  the  gift  of  comprehending  through 
wisdom. 

The  spectacle  that  was  then  suddenly  unveiled  to  the  eyes  of 
the  two  seers  overpowered  them  by  its  vastness,  for  they  felt  like 
atoms  whose  smallness  was  comparable  only  to  the  minutest 
fraction  which  infinite  divisibility  allows  man  to  conceive  of, 
brought  face  to  face  with  the  infinitely  numerous  which  God 
alone  can  contemplate  as  He  contemplates  Himself. 

What  humiliation  and  what  greatness  in  those  two  points, 
strength  and  love,  which  the  seraph's  first  desire  had  placed 
as  two  links  uniting  the  immensity  of  the  inferior  universe  to 
the  immensity  of  the  superior  universe  !  They  understood 
the  invisible  bonds  by  which  material  worlds  are  attached  to 
the  spiritual  worlds.  As  they  recalled  the  stupendous  efforts 
of  the  greatest  human  minds,  they  discerned  the  principle  of 
melody  as  they  heard  the  songs  of  heaven  which  gave  them 
all  the  sensations  of  color,  perfume,  and  thought,  and  re- 
minded them  of  the  innumerable  details  of  all  the  creations, 
as  an  earthly  song  can  revive  the  slenderest  memories  of  love. 


SERAPHITA.  151 

Strung  by  the  excessive  exaltation  of  their  faculties  to  a 
pitch  for  which  there  is  no  word  in  any  language,  for  a 
moment  they  were  suffered  to  glance  into  the  divine  sphere. 
There  all  was  gladness.  Myriads  of  angels  winged  their  way 
with  one  consent  and  without  confusion,  all  alike  but  all 
different,  as  simple  as  the  wild  rose,  as  vast  as  worlds. 

Wilfrid  and  Minna  did  not  see  them  come  nor  go ;  they 
suddenly  pervaded  the  infinite  with  their  presence,  as  stars 
appear  in  the  unfathomable  ether.  The  blaze  of  all  their 
diadems  flashed  into  light  in  space,  as  the  heavenly  fire  is 
lighted  when  the  day  rises  among  mountains.  Waves  of  light 
fell  from  their  hair,  and  their  movements  gave  rise  to  un- 
dulating throbs  like  the  dancing  waves  of  a  phosphorescent 
sea. 

The  two  seers  could  discern  the  seraph  as  a  darker  object 
amid  deathless  legions,  whose  wings  were  as  the  mighty 
plumage  of  a  forest  swept  by  the  breeze.  And  then,  as 
though  all  the  arrows  of  a  quiver  were  shot  off  at  once,  the 
spirits  dispelled  with  a  breath  every  vestige  of  his  former 
shape ;  as  the  seraph  mounted  higher  he  was  purified,  and  ere 
long  he  was  no  more  than  a  filmy  image  of  what  they  had 
seen  when  he  was  first  transfigured — lines  of  fire  with  no 
shadow.  Up  and  up,  receiving  a  fresh  gift  at  each  circle, 
while  the  sign  of  his  election  was  transmitted  to  the  highest 
heaven,  whither  he  mounted  purer  and  purer. 

None  of  the  voices  ceased  ;  the  hymn  spread  in  all  its 
modes — 

"  Hail  to  him  who  rises  to  life !  Come,  flower  of  the 
worlds,  diamond  passed  through  the  fire  of  affliction,  pearl 
without  spot,  desire  without  flesh,  new  link  between  earth  and 
heaven,  be  though  Light !  Conquering  spirit,  queen  of  the 
world,  fly  to  take  thy  crown  ;  victorious  over  the  earth,  re- 
ceive thy  diadem  !  Thou  art  one  with  us  !  " 

The  angel's  virtues  reappeared  in  all  their  beauty.  His  first 
longing  for  heaven  was  seen  in  the  grace  of  tender  infancy. 


152  SERAPHITA. 

His  deeds  adorned  him  with  brightness  like  constellations ; 
his  acts  of  faith  blazed  like  the  hyacinth  of  the  skies,  the  hue 
of  the  stars.  Charity  decked  him  with  oriental  pearls,  treas- 
ured tears.  Divine  love  bowered  him  in  roses,  and  his  pious 
resignation  by  its  whiteness  divested  him  of  every  trace  of 
earthliness. 

Soon,  to  their  eyes,  he  was  no  more  than  a  speck  of  flame, 
growing  more  and  more  intense,  its  motion  lost  in  the  melo- 
dious acclamations  that  hailed  his  arrival  in  heaven. 

The  celestial  voices  made  the  two  exiles  weep. 

Suddenly  the  silence  of  death  spread  like  a  solemn  veil 
from  the  highest  to  the  lowest  sphere,  throwing  Wilfrid  and 
Minna  into  unutterable  expectancy.  At  that  instant  the 
seraph  was  lost  in  the  heart  of  the  sanctuary,  where  he  re- 
ceived the  gift  of  eternal  life. 

Then  they  were  aware  of  an  impulse  of  intense  adoration, 
which  filled  them  with  rapture  mingled  with  awe.  They  felt 
that  every  being  had  fallen  prostrate  in  the  divine  spheres,  in 
the  spiritual  spheres,  and  in  the  worlds  of  darkness.  The 
angels  bent  the  knee  to  do  honor  to  his  glory,  the  spirits  bent 
the  knee  to  testify  to  their  eagerness,  and  in  the  abyss  all 
knelt,  shuddering  with  awe. 

A  mighty  shout  of  joy  broke  out,  as  a  choked  spring  breaks 
forth  again,  tossing  up  its  thousands  of  flower-like  jets,  mir- 
roring the  sun  which  turns  the  sparkling  drops  to  diamond 
and  pearl,  at  the  instant  when  the  seraph  emerged,  a  blaze  of 
light,  crying: 

"  Eternal !    Eternal !    Eternal !  " 

The  worlds  heard  him  and  acknowledged  him ;  he  became 
one  with  them  as  God  is,  and  entered  into  possession  of  the 
infinite. 

The  seven  divine  worlds  were  aroused  by  his  voice  and  an- 
swered him. 

At  this  instant  there  was  a  great  rush,  as  if  whole  stars 
were  purified  and  went  up  in  dazzling  glory  to  be  eternal. 


SERAPHITA.  153 

Perhaps  the  seraph's  first  duty  was  to  call  all  creations  filled 
with  the  Word  to  come  to  God. 

But  the  hallelujah  was  already  dying  away  in  the  ears  of 
Wilfrid  and  Minna,  like  the  last  waves  of  dying  music.  The 
glories  of  heaven  were  already  vanishing,  like  the  hues  of  a 
setting  sun  amid  curtains  of  purple  and  gold. 

Death  and  impurity  were  repossessing  themselves  of  their 
prey. 

As  they  resumed  the  bondage  of  the  flesh  from  which  their 
spirit  had  for  a  moment  been  released  by  a  sublime  trance,  the 
two  mortals  felt  as  on  awaking  in  the  morning  from  a  night 
of  splendid  dreams,  of  which  reminiscences  float  in  the  brain, 
though  the  senses  have  no  knowledge  of  them,  and  human 
language  would  fail  to  express  them.  The  blackness  of  the 
limbo  into  which  they  fell  was  the  sphere  where  the  sun  of 
visible  worlds  shines. 

"  We  must  go  down  again,"  said  Wilfrid  to  Minna. 

"We  will  do  as  he  bade  us,"  replied  she.  "  Having  seen 
the  worlds  moving  on  toward  God,  we  know  the  right  way. 
Our  starry  diadems  are  above  !  " 

They  fell  into  the  abyss,  into  the  dust  of  the  lower  worlds, 
and  suddenly  saw  the  earth  as  it  were  a  crypt,  of  which  the 
prospect  was  made  clear  to  them  by  the  light  they  brought 
back  in  their  souls,  for  it  still  wrapped  them  in  a  halo,  and 
through  it  they  still  vaguely  heard  the  vanishing  harmonies  of 
heaven.  This  was  the  spectacle  which  of  old  fell  on  the 
mind's  eye  of  the  prophets.  Ministers  of  all  religions,  call- 
ing themselves  true,  kings  consecrated  by  force  and  fear, 
warriors  and  conquerors  sharing  the  nations,  learned  men  and 
rich  lording  it  over  a  refractory  and  suffering  populace  whom 
they  trampled  under  foot — these  were  all  attended  by  their 
followers  and  their  women,  all  were  clad  in  robes  of  gold, 
silver,  and  azure,  covered  with  pearls  and  gems  torn  from  the 
bowels  of  the  earth  or  from  the  depths  of  the  sea  by  the 


154  SERAPHITA. 

perennial  toil  of  sweating  and  blaspheming  humanity.  But 
in  the  eyes  of  the  exiles  this  wealth  and  splendor,  harvested 
with  blood,  were  but  filthy  rags. 

"  What  do  ye  here  in  motionless  ranks?"  asked  Wilfred. 

They  made  no  answer. 

"  What  do  ye  here  in  motionless  ranks?" 

But  they  made  no  answer. 

Wilfrid  laid  his  hands  on  them  and  shouted — 

"  What  do  ye  here  in  motionless  ranks?  " 

By  a  common  impulse  they  all  opened  their  robes  and 
showed  him  their  bodies,  dried  up,  eaten  by  worms,  corrupt, 
putrid,  crumbling  to  dust,  and  rotten  with  horrible  diseases. 

"  Ye  lead  the  nations  to  death,"  said  Wilfrid;  "ye  have 
defiled  the  earth,  perverted  the  Word,  prostituted  justice.  Ye 
have  eaten  the  herb  of  the  field,  and  now  ye  would  kill  the 
lambs  !  Do  ye  think  that  there  is  justification  in  showing  your 
wounds?  I  shall  warn  those  of  my  brethren  who  still  can 
hear  the  Voice,  that  they  may  slake  their  thirst  at  the  springs 
that  you  have  hidden." 

"Let  us  save  our  strength  for  prayer,"  said  Minna.  "It 
is  not  your  mission  to  be  a  prophet,  nor  a  redeemer,  nor  an 
evangelist.  We  are  as  yet  only  on  the  margin  of  the  lowest 
sphere ;  let  us  strive  to  cleave  through  space  on  the  pinions  of 
prayer." 

"  You  are  my  sole  love  !  " 

"  You  are  my  sole  strength  !  " 

"We  have  had  a  glimpse  of  the  higher  mysteries;  we  are, 
each  to  the  other,  the  only  creatures  here  below  with  whom 
joy  and  grief  are  conceivable.  Come  then,  we  will  pray ; 
we  know  the  road,  we  will  walk  in  it." 

"  Give  me  your  hand,"  said  the  girl.  "  If  we  always  walk 
together,  the  path  will  seem  less  rough  and  not  so  long." 

"Only  with  you,"  said  the  young  man,  "could  I  traverse 
that  vast  desert  without  allowing  myself  to  repine." 

"  And  we  will  go  to  heaven  together  !  "  said  she. 


SERAPHITA.  155 

The  clouds  fell,  forming  a  dark  canopy.  Suddenly  the 
lovers  found  themselves  kneeling  by  a  dead  body,  which  old 
David  was  protecting  from  prying  curiosity,  and  insisted  on 
burying  with  his  own  hands. 

Outside,  the  first  summer  of  the  nineteeth  century  was  in  all 
its  glory;  the  lovers  fancied  they  could  hear  a  voice  in  the 
sunbeams.  They  breathed  heavenly  perfume  from  the  new- 
born flowers,  and  said  as  they  took  each  other  by  the  hand — 

"  The  vast  ocean  that  gleams  out  there  is  an  image  of  that 
we  saw  above  ! ' ' 

"  Whither  are  you  going?  "  asked  Pastor  Becker. 

"We  mean  to  go  to  God,"  said  they.  "  Come  with  us, 
father." 

GENEVA  AND  PARIS,  December,  1833 — November,  1835. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

DEDICATION  : 
*'Et  nunc  et  semper  dilecta  dicatum" 

Louis  LAMBERT  was  born  in  1797  at  Montoire,  a  little  town 
in  the  Vendomois,  where  his  father  owned  a  tannery  of  no  great 
magnitude,  and  intended  that  his  son  should  succeed  him  ;  but 
his  precocious  bent  for  study  modified  the  paternal  decision. 
For,  indeed,  the  tanner  and  his  wife  adored  Louis,  their  only 
child,  and  never  contradicted  him  in  anything. 

At  the  age  of  five  Louis  had  begun  by  reading  the  Old  and  New 
Testaments;  and  these  two  Books,  including  so  many  books, 
had  sealed  his  fate.  Could  that  childish  imagination  under- 
stand the  mystical  depths  of  the  Scriptures  ?  Could  it  so  early 
follow  the  flight  of  the  Holy  Spirit  across  the  worlds  ?  Or 
was  it  merely  attracted  by  the  romantic  touches  which  abound 
in  those  Oriental  poems !  Our  narrative  will  answer  these 
questions  to  some  readers. 

One  thing  resulted  from  this  first  reading  of  the  Bible: 
Louis  went  all  over  Montoire  begging  for  books,  and  he  ob- 
tained them  by  those  winning  ways  peculiar  to  children, 
which  no  one  can  resist.  While  devoting  himself  to  these 
studies  under  no  sort  of  guidance,  he  reached  the  age  of  ten. 

At  that  period  substitutes  for  the  army  were  scarce ;  rich 
families  secured  them  long  beforehand  to  have  them  ready 
when  the  lots  were  drawn.  The  poor  tanner's  modest  fortune 
did  not  allow  of  their  purchasing  a  substitute  for  their  son, 
and  they  saw  no  means  allowed  by  law  for  evading  the  con- 
scription but  that  of  making  him  a  priest;  so,  in  1807,  they 
sent  him  to  his  maternal  uncle,  the  parish  priest  of  Mer,  an- 
other small  town  on  the  Loire,  not  far  from  Blois.  This 
(156) 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  157 

arrangement  at  once  satisfied  Louis'  passion  for  knowledge, 
and  his  parents'  wish  not  to  expose  him  to  the  dreadful 
chances  of  war  ;  and,  indeed,  his  taste  for  study  and  preco- 
cious intelligence  gave  grounds  for  hoping  that  he  might  rise 
to  high  fortune  in  the  church. 

After  remaining  for  about  three  years  with  his  uncle,  an  old 
and  not  uncultured  Oratorian,  Louis  left  him  early  in  1811  to 
enter  the  college  at  Vendome,  where  he  was  maintained  at 
the  cost  of  Madame  de  Stael. 

Lambert  owed  the  favor  and  patronage  of  this  celebrated 
lady  to  chance,  or  shall  we  not  say  to  Providence,  who  can 
smooth  the  path  of  forlorn  genius.  To  us,  indeed,  who  do 
not  see  below  the  surface  of  human  things,  such  vicissitudes, 
of  which  we  find  many  examples  in  the  lives  of  great  men, 
appear  to  be  merely  the  result  of  physical  phenomena;  to 
most  biographers  the  head  of  a  man  of  genius  rises  above  the 
herd  as  some  noble  plant  in  the  fields  attracts  the  eye  of  the 
botanist  by  its  splendor.  This  comparison  may  well  be  ap- 
plied to  Louis  Lambert's  adventure ;  he  was  accustomed  to 
spend  the  time  allowed  him  by  his  uncle  for  holidays  at  his 
father's  house  ;  but  instead  of  indulging,  after  the  manner  of 
schoolboys,  in  the  sweets  of  the  delightful  far  niente  that 
tempts  us  at  every  age,  he  set  out  every  morning  with  part  of 
a  loaf  and  his  books,  and  went  to  read  and  meditate  in  the 
woods,  to  escape  his  mother's  remonstrances,  for  she  believed 
such  persistent  study  to  be  injurious.  How  admirable  is  a 
mother's  instinct  !  From  that  time  reading  was  in  Louis  a 
sort  of  appetite  which  nothing  could  satisfy;  he  devoured 
books  of  every  kind,  feeding  indiscriminately  on  religious 
works,  history,  philosophy,  and  physics.  He  has  told  me 
that  he  found  indescribable  delight  in  reading  dictionaries 
for  lack  of  other  books,  and  I  readily  believed  him.  What 
scholar  has  not  many  a  time  found  pleasure  in  seeking  the 
probable  meaning  of  some  unknown  word  ?  The  analysis  of 
a  word,  its  physiognomy  and  history,  would  be  to  Lambert 


158  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

matter  for  long  dreaming.  But  these  were  not  the  instinctive 
dreams  by  which  a  boy  accustoms  himself  to  the  phenomena 
of  life,  steels  himself  to  every  moral  or  physical  perception — 
an  involuntary  education  which  subsequently  brings  forth  fruit 
both  in  the  understanding  and  character  of  a  man  ;  no,  Louis 
mastered  the  facts,  and  he  accounted  for  them  after  seeking 
out  both  the  principle  and  the  end  with  the  mother  wit  of  a 
savage.  Indeed,  from  the  age  of  fourteen,  by  one  of  those 
startling  freaks  in  which  nature  sometimes  indulges,  and  which 
proved  how  anomalous  was  his  temperament,  he  would  utter 
quite  simply  ideas  of  which  the  depth  was  not  revealed  to  me 
till  a  long  time  after. 

"  Often,"  he  has  said  to  me  when  speaking  of  his  studies, 
"  often  have  I  made  the  most  delightful  voyage,  floating  on  a 
word  down  the  abyss  of  the  past,  like  an  insect  embarked  on 
a  blade  of  grass  tossing  on  the  ripples  of  a  stream.  Starting 
from  Greece,  I  would  get  to  Rome,  and  traverse  the  whole 
extent  of  modern  ages.  What  a  fine  book  might  be  written 
of  the  life  and  adventures  of  a  word  !  It  has,  of  course,  re- 
ceived various  stamps  from  the  occasions  on  which  it  has 
served  its  purpose;  it  has  conveyed  different  ideas  in  different 
places ;  but  is  it  not  still  grander  to  think  of  it  under  the 
three  aspects  of  soul,  body,  and  motion  ?  Merely  to  regard 
it  in  the  abstract,  apart  from  its  functions,  its  effects,  and  its 
influence,  is  enough  to  cast  one  into  an  ocean  of  meditations? 
Are  not  most  words  colored  by  the  idea  they  represent  ? 
Then,  to  whose  genius  are  they  due  ?  If  it  takes  great  intelli- 
gence to  create  a  word,  how  old  may  human  speech  be  ?  The 
combination  of  letters,  their  shapes,  and  the  look  they  give  to 
the  word  are  the  exact  reflection,  in  accordance  with  the 
character  of  each  nation,  of  the  unknown  beings  whose  traces 
survive  in  us. 

"Who  can  philosophically  explain  the  transition  from  sen- 
sation to  thought,  from  thought  to  word,  from  the  word  to  its 
hieroglyphic  presentment,  from  hieroglyphics  to  the  alphabet, 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  159 

from  the  alphabet  to  written  language,  of  which  the  eloquent 
beauty  resides  in  a  series  of  images,  classified  by  rhetoric,  and 
forming,  in  a  sense,  the  hieroglyphics  of  thought?  Was  it 
not  the  ancient  mode  of  representing  human  ideas  as  embodied 
in  the  forms  of  animals  that  gave  rise  to  the  shapes  of  the  first 
signs  used  in  the  East  for  writing  down  language?  Then  has 
it  not  left  its  traces  by  tradition  on  our  modern  languages, 
which  have  all  seized  some  remnant  of  the  primitive  speech 
of  nations,  a  majestic  and  solemn  tongue  whose  grandeur  and 
solemnity  decrease  as  communities  grow  old  ;  whose  sonorous 
tones  ring  in  the  Hebrew  Bible,  and  still  are  noble  in  Greece, 
but  grow  weaker  under  the  progress  of  successive  phases  of 
civilization  ? 

"  Is  it  to  this  time-honored  spirit  that  we  owe  the  mysteries 
lying  buried  in  every  human  word?  In  the  word  TRUE 
(vrai^)  do  we  not  discern  a  certain  imaginary  rectitude?  Does 
not  the  compact  brevity  of  its  sound  suggest  a  vague  image  of 
chaste  nudity  and  the  simplicity  of  Truth  in  all  things?  The 
syllable  seems  to  me  singularly  crisp  and  fresh. 

"  I  chose  the  formula  of  an  abstract  idea  on  purpose,  not 
wishing  to  illustrate  the  case  by  a  word  which  should  make  it 
too  obvious  to  the  apprehension,  as  the  word  FLIGHT  (fuite), 
for  instance,  which  is  a  direct  appeal  to  the  senses. 

"But  is  it  not  so  with  every  root-word?  They  all  are 
stamped  with  a  living  power  that  comes  from  the  soul,  and 
which  they  restore  to  the  soul  through  the  mysterious  and 
wonderful  action  and  reaction  between  thought  and  speech. 
Might  we  not  speak  of  it  as  a  lover  who  finds  on  his  mistress' 
lips  as  much  love  as  he  gives  ?  Thus,  by  their  mere  physiog- 
nomy, words  call  to  life  in  our  brain  the  beings  which  they 
serve  to  clothe.  Like  all  beings,  there  is  but  one  place  where 
their  properties  are  at  full  liberty  to  act  and  develop.  But 
the  subject  demands  a  science  to  itself,  perhaps?  " 

And  he  would  shrug  his  shoulders,  as  much  as  to  say,  "  But 
we  are  too  high  and  too  low !  " 


160  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

Louis'  passion  for  reading  had  on  the  whole  been  very 
well  satisfied.  The  cure"  of  Mer  had  two  or  three  thousand 
volumes.  This  treasure  had  been  derived  from  the  plunder 
committed  during  the  Revolution  in  the  neighboring  chateaux 
and  abbeys.  As  a  priest  who  had  taken  the  oath,  the  worthy 
man  had  been  able  to  choose  the  best  books  from  among  these 
precious  libraries,  which  were  sold  by  the  pound.  In  three 
years  Louis  Lambert  had  assimilated  the  contents  of  all  the 
books  in  his  uncle's  library  that  were  worth  reading.  The 
process  of  absorbing  ideas  by  means  of  reading  had  become 
in  him  a  very  strange  phenomenon.  His  eye  took  in  six  or 
seven  lines  at  once,  and  his  mind  grasped  the  sense  with  a 
swiftness  as  remarkable  as  that  of  his  eye ;  sometimes  even 
one  word  in  a  sentence  was  enough  to  enable  him  to  seize  the 
gist  of  the  matter. 

His  memory  was  prodigious.  He  remembered  with  equal 
exactitude  the  ideas  he  had  derived  from  reading,  and  those 
which  had  occurred  to  him  in  the  course  of  meditation  or 
conversation.  Indeed,  he  had  every  form  of  memory — for 
places,  for  names,  for  words,  things,  and  faces.  He  not 
only  recalled  any  object  at  will,  but  he  saw  them  in  his 
mind,  situated,  lighted,  and  colored  as  he  had  originally 
seen  them.  And  this  power  he  could  exert  with  equal  effect 
with  regard  to  the  most  abstract  efforts  of  the  intellect.  He 
could  remember,  as  he  said,  not  merely  the  position  of  a 
sentence  in  the  book  where  he  had  met  with  it,  but  the  frame 
of  mind  he  had  been  in  at  remotest  dates.  Thus  his  was  the 
singular  privilege  of  being  able  to  retrace  in  memory  the 
whole  life  and  progress  of  his  mind,  from  the  ideas  he  had 
first  acquired  to  the  last  thought  evolved  in  it,  from  the  most 
obscure  to  the  clearest.  His  brain,  accustomed  in  early  youth 
to  the  mysterious  mechanism  by  which  human  faculties  are 
concentrated,  drew  from  this  rich  treasury  endless  images  full 
of  life  and  freshness,  on  which  he  fed  his  spirit  during  those 
lucid  spells  of  contemplation. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  161 

"  Whenever  I  wish  it,"  said  he  to  me  in  his  own  language, 
to  which  a  fund  of  remembrance  gave  precocious  originality, 
"  I  can  draw  a  veil  over  my  eyes.  Then  I  suddenly  see  within 
me  a  camera  obscura,  where  natural  objects  are  reproduced  in 
purer  forms  than  those  under  which  they  first  appeared  to  my 
external  sense." 

At  the  age  of  twelve  his  imagination,  stimulated  by  the  per- 
petual exercise  of  his  faculties,  had  developed  to  a  point  which 
permitted  him  to  have  such  precise  conceptions  of  things, 
which  he  knew  only  from  reading  about  them,  that  the  image 
stamped  on  his  mind  could  not  have  been  clearer  if  he  had 
actually  seen  them,  whether  this  was  by  a  process  of  analogy 
or  that  he  was  gifted  with  a  sort  of  second-sight  by  which  he 
could  command  all  nature. 

"  When  I  read  the  story  of  the  battle  of  Austerlitz,"  said 
he  to  me  one  day,  "  I  saw  every  incident.  The  roar  of  the 
cannon,  the  cries  of  the  fighting  men  rang  in  my  ears,  and 
made  my  inmost  self  quiver ;  I  could  smell  the  powder ;  I  heard 
the  clatter  of  horses  and  the  voices  of  men  ;  I  looked  down  on 
the  plain  where  armed  nations  were  in  collision,  just  as  if  I 
had  been  on  the  heights  of  Santon.  The  scene  was  as  terrify- 
ing as  a  passage  from  the  Apocalypse."  On  the  occasions 
when  he  brought  all  his  powers  into  play,  and  in  some  degree 
lost  consciousness  of  his  physical  existence,  and  lived  on  only 
by  the  remarkable  energy  of  his  mental  powers,  whose  sphere 
was  enormously  expanded,  he  left  space  behind  him,  to  use 
his  own  words. 

But  I  will  not  here  anticipate  the  intellectual  phases  of  his 
life.  Already,  in  spite  of  myself,  I  have  reversed  the  order  in 
which  I  ought  to  tell  the  history  of  this  man,  who  transferred 
all  his  activities  to  thinking,  as  others  throw  all  their  life  into 
action. 

A  strong  bias  drew  his  mind  to  mystical  studies. 

"Abyssus  abyssum"  he  would  say.     "  Our  spirit  is  abysmal 
and  loves  the  abyss.     In  childhood,  manhood,  and  old  age  we 
11 


162  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

are  always  eager  for  mysteries  in  whatever  form  they  present 
themselves. ' ' 

This  predilection  was  disastrous ;  if  indeed  his  life  can  be 
measured  by  ordinary  standards,  or  if  we  may  gauge  another's 
happiness  by  our  own  or  by  social  notions.  This  taste  for  the 
"  things  of  heaven,"  another  phrase  he  was  fond  of  using,  this 
metis  divinior,  was  due  perhaps  to  the  influence  produced  on 
his  mind  by  the  first  books  he  read  at  his  uncle's.  Saint 
Theresa  and  Madame  Guyon  were  a  sequel  to  the  Bible;  they 
had  the  first-fruits  of  his  manly  intelligence,  and  accustomed 
him  to  those  swift  reactions  of  the  soul  of  which  ecstasy  is  at 
once  the  result  and  the  means.  This  line  of  study,  this  pecu- 
liar taste,  elevated  his  heart,  purified,  ennobled  it,  gave  him 
an  appetite  for  the  divine  nature,  and  suggested  to  him  the 
almost  womanly  refinement  of  feeling  which  is  instinctive  in 
great  men  ;  perhaps  their  sublime  superiority  is  no  more  than 
the  desire  to  devote  themselves  which  characterizes  woman, 
only  transferred  to  the  greatest  things. 

As  a  result  of  these  early  impressions,  Louis  passed  immacu- 
late through  his  school-life ;  this  beautiful  virginity  of  the 
senses  naturally  resulted  in  the  richer  fervor  of  his  blood,  and 
in  increased  faculties  of  mind. 

The  Baroness  de  Stael,  forbidden  to  come  within  forty 
leagues  of  Paris,  spent  several  months  of  her  banishment  on  an 
estate  near  Vendome.  One  day,  when  out  walking,  she  met 
on  the  outskirts  of  the  park  the  tanner's  son,  almost  in  rags, 
and  absorbed  in  reading.  The  book  was  a  translation  of 
"  Heaven  and  Hell."  At  that  time  Monsieur  Saint-Martin, 
Monsieur  de  Gence,  and  a  few  other  French  or  half-German 
writers  were  almost  the  only  persons  in  the  French  Empire  to 
whom  the  name  of  Swedenborg  was  known.  Madame  de 
Stael,  greatly  surprised,  took  the  book  from  him  with  the 
roughness  she  affected  in  her  questions,  looks,  and  manners, 
and  with  a  keen  glance  at  Lambert : 

"Do  you  understand  all  this?"  she  asked. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  163 

"  Do  you  pray  to  God  ?  "  said  the  child. 

"Why?  yes." 

"And  do  you  understand  Him?" 

The  baroness  was  silent  for  a  moment ;  then  she  sat  down 
by  Lambert,  and  began  to  talk  to  him.  Unfortunately,  my 
memory,  though  retentive,  is  far  from  being  so  trustworthy  as 
my  friend's,  and  I  have  forgotten  the  whole  of  the  dialogue 
excepting  those  first  words. 

Such  a  meeting  was  of  a  kind  to  strike  Madame  de  Stael 
very  greatly  ;  on  her  return  home  she  said  but  little  about  it, 
notwithstanding  an  effusiveness  which  in  her  became  mere 
loquacity ;  but  it  evidently  occupied  her  thoughts. 

The  only  person  now  living  who  preserves  any  recollection 
of  the  incident,  and  whom  I  catechised  to  be  informed  of 
what  few  words  Madame  de  Stael  had  let  drop,  could  with 
difficulty  recall  these  words  spoken  by  the  baroness  as  describ- 
ing Lambert,  "  He  is  a  real  seer." 

Louis  failed  to  justify  in  the  eyes  of  the  world  the  high 
hopes  he  had  inspired  in  his  protectress.  The  transient  favor 
she  showed  him  was  regarded  as  a  feminine  caprice,  one  of  the 
fancies  characteristic  of  artist  souls.  Madame  de  Stael  de- 
termined to  save  Louis  Lambert  alike  from  serving  the  Em- 
peror or  the  church,  and  to  preserve  him  for  the  glorious 
destiny  which,  she  thought,  awaited  him  ;  for  she  made  him 
out  to  be  a  second  Moses  snatched  from  the  waters.  Before 
her  departure  she  instructed  a  friend  of  hers,  Monsieur  de 
Corbigny,  to  send  her  Moses  in  due  course  to  the  High 
School  at  Vendome ;  then  she  probably  forgot  him. 

Having  entered  this  college  at  the  age  of  fourteen,  early  in 
1811,  Lambert  would  leave  it  at  the  end  of  1814,  when  he 
had  finished  the  course  of  Philosophy.  I  doubt  whether  dur- 
ing the  whole  time  he  ever  heard  a  word  of  his  benefactress—- 
if, indeed,  it  was  the  act  of  a  benefactress  to  pay  for  a  lad's 
schooling  for  three  years  without  a  thought  of  his  future  pros- 


164  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

pects,  after  diverting  him  from  a  career  in  which  he  might 
have  found  happiness.  The  circumstances  of  the  time,  and 
Louis  Lambert's  character,  may  to  a  great  extent  absolve 
Madame  de  Stael  for  her  thoughtlessness  and  her  generosity. 
The  gentleman  who  was  to  have  kept  up  communications 
between  her  and  the  boy  left  Blois  just  at  the  time  when 
Louis  passed  out  of  the  college.  The  political  events  that 
ensued  were  then  a  sufficient  excuse  for  this  gentleman's 
neglect  of  the  baroness'  protege.  The  authoress  of  "  Cor- 
inne"  heard  no  more  of  her  little  Moses. 

A  hundred  louis,  which  she  placed  in  the  hands  of  Mon- 
sier  de  Corbigny,  who  died,  I  believe,  in  1812,  was  not  a 
sufficiently  large  sum  to  leave  lasting  memories  in  Madame  de 
Stael.,  whose  excitable  nature  found  ample  pasture  during  the 
vicissitudes  of  1814  and  1815,  which  absorbed  all  her  interest. 

At  this  time  Louis  Lambert  was  at  once  too  proud  and  too 
poor  to  go  in  search  of  a  patroness  who  was  traveling  all 
over  Europe.  However,  he  went  on  foot  from  Blois  to  Paris 
in  the  hope  of  seeing  her,  and  arrived,  unluckily,  on  the  very 
day  of  her  death.  Two  letters  from  Lambert  to  the  baroness 
remained  unanswered.  The  memory  of  Madame  de  Stael's 
good  intentions  with  regard  to  Louis  remains,  therefore,  only 
in  some  few  young  minds,  struck,  as  mine  was,  by  the  strange- 
ness of  the  story. 

No  one  who  had  not  gone  through  the  training  at  our  college 
could  understand  the  effect  usually  made  on  our  minds  by 
the  announcement  that  a  "  new  boy"  had  arrived,  or  the  im- 
pression that  such  an  adventure  as  Louis  Lambert's  was  calcu- 
lated to  produce. 

And  here  a  little  information  must  be  given  as  to  the 
primitive  administration  of  this  institution,  originally  half- 
military  and  half-monastic,  to  explain  the  new  life  which 
there  awaited  Lambert.  Before  the  Revolution,  the  Oratorians, 
devoted,  like  the  Society  of  Jesus,  to  the  education  of  youth 
— succeeding  the  Jesuits,  in  fact,  in  certain  of  their  establish- 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  165 

ments — had  various  provincial  houses,  of  which  the  most 
famous  were  the  colleges  of  Vendome,  of  Tournon,  of  la 
Fleche,  Pout-Levoy,  Sorreze,  and  Juilly.  That  at  Vendome, 
like  the  others,  I  believe,  turned  out  a  certain  number  of 
cadets  for  the  army.  The  abolition  of  educational  bodies, 
decreed  by  the  Convention,  had  but  little  effect  on  the  college 
at  Vendome.  When  the  first  crisis  had  blown  over,  the 
authorities  recovered  possession  of  their  buildings;  certain 
Oratorians,  scattered  about  the  country,  came  back  to  the 
college  and  reopened  it  under  the  old  rules,  with  the  habits, 
practices,  and  customs  which  gave  this  school  a  character  with 
which  I  have  seen  nothing  at  all  comparable  in  any  that  I 
have  visited  since  I  left  that  establishment. 

Standing  in  the  heart  of  the  town,  on  the  little  river  Loir 
which  flows  under  its  walls,  the  college  possesses  extensive 
precincts,  carefully  inclosed  by  walls,  and  including  all  the 
buildings  necessary  for  an  institution  on  that  scale :  a  chapel, 
a  theatre,  an  infirmary,  a  bakehouse,  gardens,  and  water- 
supply.  This  college  is  the  most  celebrated  home  of  learning 
in  all  the  central  provinces,  and  receives  pupils  from  them  and 
from  the  colonies.  Distance  prohibits  any  frequent  visits 
from  parents  to  their  children. 

The  rule  of  the  House  forbids  holidays  away  from  it.  Once 
entered  there,  a  pupil  never  leaves  till  his  studies  are  finished. 
With  the  exception  of  walks  taken  under  the  guidance  of  the 
fathers,  everything  is  calculated  to  give  the  school  the  benefit 
of  conventual  discipline  ;  in  my  day  the  tawse  was  still  a  living 
memory,  and  the  classical  leather  strap  played  its  terrible  part 
with  all  the  honors.  The  punishments  originally  invented  by 
the  Society  of  Jesus,  as  alarming  to  the  moral  as  to  the  physi- 
cal man,  were  still  in  force  in  all  the  integrity  of  the  original 
code. 

Letters  to  parents  were  obligatory  on  certain  days,  so  was 
confession.  Thus  our  sins  and  our  sentiments  were  all 
according  to  pattern.  Everything  bore  the  stamp  of  monastic 


168  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

rule.  I  well  remember,  among  other  relics  of  the  ancient 
order,  the  inspection  we  went  through  every  Sunday.  We 
were  all  in  our  best,  placed  in  file  like  soldiers  to  await  the 
arrival  of  the  two  inspectors  who,  attended  by  the  tutors  and 
the  tradesmen,  examined  us  from  the  three  points  of  view  of 
dress,  health,  and  morals. 

The  two  or  three  hundred  pupils  lodged  in  the  establish- 
ment were  divided,  according  to  ancient  custom,  into  the 
minimcs  (the  smallest),  the  little  boys,  the  middle  boys,  and 
the  big  boys.  The  division  of  the  minimcs  included  the 
eighth  and  seventh  classes ;  the  little  boys  formed  the  sixth, 
fifth,  and  fourth ;  the  middle  boys  were  classed  as  third  and 
second  ;  and  the  first  class  comprised  the  senior  students — of 
philosophy,  rhetoric,  the  higher  mathematics,  and  chemistry. 
Each  of  these  divisions  had  its  own  building,  class-rooms,  and 
play-ground,  in  the  large  common  precincts  on  to  which  the 
class-rooms  opened,  and  beyond  which  was  the  refectory. 

This  dining-hall,  worthy  of  an  ancient  religious  order, 
accommodated  all  the  school.  Contrary  to  the  usual  practice 
in  educational  institutions,  we  were  allowed  to  talk  at  our 
meals,  a  tolerant  Oratorian  rule  which  enabled  us  to  exchange 
plates  according  to  our  taste.  This  gastronomical  barter  was 
always  one  of  the  chief  pleasures  of  our  college  life.  If  one 
of  the  "  middle  "  boys  at  the  head  of  his  table  wished  for  a 
helping  of  lentils  instead  of  dessert — for  we  had  dessert — the 
offer  was  passed  down  from  one  to  another:  "Dessert  for 
lentils  !  "  till  some  other  epicure  had  accepted  ;  then  the 
plate  of  lentils  was  passed  up  to  the  bidder  from  hand  to 
hand,  and  the  plate  of  dessert  returned  by  the  same  road. 
Mistakes  were  never  made.  If  several  identical  offers  were 
made,  they  were  taken  in  order,  and  the  formula  would  be, 
"Lentils  number  one  for  dessert  number  one."  The  tables 
were  very  long ;  our  incessant  barter  kept  everything  mov- 
ing ;  we  transacted  it  with  amazing  eagerness ;  and  the  chatter 
of  three  hundred  lads,  the  bustling  to  and  fro  of  the  servants 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  167 

employed  in  changing  the  plates,  setting  down  the  dishes, 
handing  the  bread,  with  the  tours  of  inspection  of  the  masters, 
made  this  refectory  at  Vendome  a  scene  unique  in  its  way,  and 
the  amazement  of  visitors. 

To  make  our  life  more  tolerable,  deprived  as  we  were  of  all 
communication  with  the  outer  world  and  of  family  affection, 
we  were  allowed  to  keep  pigeons  and  to  have  gardens.  Our 
two  or  three  hundred  pigeon-houses,  with  a  thousand  birds 
nesting  all  round  the  outer  wall,  and  above  thirty  garden 
plots,  were  a  sight  even  stranger  than  our  meals.  But  a  full 
account  of  the  peculiarities  which  made  the  college  at  Ven- 
dome a  place  unique  in  itself  and  fertile  in  reminiscences  to 
those  who  spent  their  boyhood  there  would  be  weariness  to 
the  reader.  Which  of  us  all  but  remembers  with  delight,  not- 
withstanding the  bitterness  of  learning,  the  eccentric  pleasures 
of  that  cloistered  life  ?  The  sweetmeats  purchased  by  stealth 
in  the  course  of  our  walks,  permission  obtained  to  play  cards 
and  devise  theatrical  performances  during  the  holidays,  such 
tricks  and  freedom  as  were  necessitated  by  our  seclusion ; 
then,  again,  our  military  band,  a  relic  of  the  cadets ;  our 
academy,  our  chaplain,  our  father  professors,  and  all  our 
games  permitted  or  prohibited,  as  the  case  might  be;  the 
cavalry  charges  on  stilts,  the  long  slides  made  in  winter,  the 
clatter  of  our  clogs ;  and,  above  all,  the  trading  transactions 
with  "  the  store  "  set  up  in  the  courtyard  itself. 

This  store  was  kept  by  a  sort  of  cheap-jack,  of  whom  big 
and  little  boys  could  procure — according  to  his  prospectus — 
boxes,  stilts,  tools,  Jacobin  pigeons,  and  nuns,*  mass-books — • 
an  article  in  small  demand — penknives,  paper,  pens,  pencils, 
ink  of  all  colors,  balls,  and  marbles;  in  short,  the  whole 
catalogue  of  the  most  treasured  possessions  of  boys,  including 
everything  from  sauce  for  the  pigeons  we  were  obliged  to  kill 
off,  to  the  earthenware  pots  in  which  we  set  aside  the  rice 
from  supper  to  be  eaten  at  next  morning's  breakfast.  Which 
*  Nontiette  ;  ginger-bread. 


168  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

of  us  is  so  unhappy  as  to  have  forgotten  how  his  heart  beat  at 
the  sight  of  this  booth,  open  periodically  during  play-hours 
on  Sundays,  to  which  we  went,  each  in  his  turn,  to  spend  his 
little  pocket-money ;  while  the  smallness  of  the  sum  allowed 
by  our  parents  for  these  minor  pleasures  required  us  to  make 
a  choice  among  all  the  objects  that  appealed  so  strongly  to 
our  desires  ?  Did  ever  a  young  wife,  to  whom  her  husband, 
during  the  first  days  of  happiness,  hands,  twelve  times  a  year, 
a  purse  of  gold,  the  budget  of  her  personal  fancies,  dream  of 
so  many  different  purchases,  each  of  which  would  absorb  the 
whole  sum,  as  we  imagined  possible  on  the  eve  of  the  first 
Sunday  in  each  month  ?  For  six  francs  during  one  night  we 
owned  every  delight  of  that  inexhaustible  store  !  and  during 
mass  every  response  we  chanted  was  mixed  up  in  our  minds 
with  our  secret  calculations.  Which  of  us  all  can  recollect 
ever  having  had  a  sou  left  to  spend  on  the  Sunday  following? 
And  which  of  us  but  obeyed  the  instinctive  law  of  social 
existence  by  pitying,  helping,  and  despising  those  pariahs 
who,  by  the  avarice  or  poverty  of  their  parents,  found  them- 
selves penniless  ? 

Any  one  who  forms  a  clear  idea  of  this  huge  college,  with 
its  monastic  buildings  in  the  heart  of  a  little  town,  and  the 
four  plots  in  which  we  were  distributed  as  by  a  monastic  rule, 
will  easily  conceive  of  the  excitement  that  we  felt  at  the  arrival 
of  a  new  boy,  a  passenger  suddenly  embarked  on  the  ship. 
No  young  duchess,  on  her  first  appearance  at  Court,  was  ever 
more  spitefully  criticised  than  the  new  boy  by  the  youths  in 
his  division.  Usually  during  the  evening  play-hour  before 
prayers,  those  sycophants  who  were  accustomed  to  ingratiate 
themselves  with  the  fathers  who  took  it  in  turns  two  and  two 
for  a  week  to  keep  an  eye  on  us,  would  be  the  first  to  hear  on 
trustworthy  authority :  "  There  will  be  a  new  boy  to-morrow !  " 
and  then  suddenly  the  shout,  "A  New  Boy  !  A  New  Boy  !  " 
rang  through  the  courts.  We  hurried  up  to  crowd  round  the 
superintendent  and  pestered  him  with  questions — 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  169 

"  Whence  was  he  coming  ?  What  was  his  name  ?  In  which 
class  would  he  be?  "  and  so  forth. 

Louis  Lambert's  advent  was  the  subject  of  a  romance 
worthy  of  the  "Arabian  Nights."  I  was  in  the  fourth  class 
at  the  time — among  the  little  boys.  Our  housemasters  were 
two  men  whom  we  called  fathers  from  habit  and  tradition, 
though  they  were  not  priests.  In  my  time  there  were,  indeed, 
but  three  genuine  Oratorians  to  whom  this  title  legitimately 
belonged ;  in  1814  they  all  left  the  college,  which  had  gradu- 
ally become  secularized,  to  find  occupation  about  the  altar  in 
various  country  parishes,  like  the  cure  of  Mer. 

Father  Haugoult,  the  master  for  the  week,  was  not  a  bad 
man,  but  of  very  moderate  attainments,  and  he  lacked  the  tact 
which  is  indispensable  for  discerning  the  different  characters 
of  children,  and  graduating  their  punishment  to  their  powers 
of  resistance.  Father  Haugoult,  then,  began  very  obligingly  to 
communicate  to  his  pupils  the  wonderful  events  which  were  to 
end  on  the  morrow  in  the  advent  of  the  most  singular  of 
"new  boys."  Games  were  at  an  end.  All  the  children 
came  round  in  silence  to  hear  the  story  of  Louis  Lambert, 
discovered,  like  an  aerolite,  by  Madame  de  Stael,  in  a  corner 
of  the  wood.  Monsieur  Haugoult  had  to  tell  us  all  about 
Madame  de  Stael ;  that  evening  she  seemed  to  me  ten  feet 
high  ;  I  saw  at  a  later  time  a  picture  of  Corinne,  in  which 
Gerard  represents  her  as  so  tall  and  handsome ;  and,  alas !  the 
woman  painted  by  my  imagination  so  far  transcended  this, 
that  the  real  Madame  de  Stael  fell  at  once  in  my  estimation, 
even  after  I  read  her  book  of  really  masculine  power,  "  De 
1'Allemagne." 

But  Lambert  at  that  time  was  an  even  greater  wonder. 
Monsieur  Mareschal,  the  headmaster,  after  examining  him,  had 
thought  of  placing  him  among  the  senior  boys.  It  was 
Louis'  ignorance  of  Latin  that  placed  him  so  low  as  the  fourth 
class,  but  he  would  certainly  leap  up  a  class  every  year; 
and,  as  a  remarkable  exception,  he  was  to  be  one  of  the 


170  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

"Academy."  Proh  pudor!  we  were  to  have  the  honor  of 
counting  among  the  "little  boys"  one  whose  coat  was 
adorned  with  the  red  ribbon  displayed  by  the  "Academi- 
cians "  of  Vendome.  These  Academicians  enjoyed  distin- 
guished privileges ;  they  often  dined  at  the  director's  table, 
and  held  two  literary  meetings  annually,  at  which  we  were  all 
present  to  hear  their  elucubrations.  An  Academician  was 
a  great  man  in  embryo.  And  if  every  Vendome  scholar 
would  speak  the  truth,  he  would  confess  that,  in  later  life,  an 
Academician  of  the  great  French  Academy  seemed  to  him  far 
less  remarkable  than  the  stupendous  boy  who  wore  the  cross 
and  the  imposing  red  ribbon  which  were  the  insignia  of  our 
"Academy." 

It  was  very  unusual  to  be  one  of  that  illustrious  body  before 
attaining  to  the  second  class,  for  the  Academicians  were  ex- 
pected to  hold  public  meetings  every  Thursday  during  the 
holidays,  and  to  read  tales  in  verse  or  prose,  epistles,  essays, 
tragedies,  dramas — compositions  far  above  the  intelligence  of 
the  lower  classes.  I  long  treasured  the  memory  of  a  story 
called  the  "Green  Ass,"  which  was,  I  think,  the  masterpiece 
of  this  unknown  society.  In  the  fourth,  and  an  Academician  ! 
This  boy  of  fourteen  a  poet  already,  the  protege  of  Madame 
de  Stael,  a  coming  genius,  said  Father  Haugoult,  was  to  be 
one  of  us  !  a  wizard,  a  youth  capable  of  writing  a  composition 
or  a  translation  while  we  were  being  called  in  to  lessons,  and 
of  learning  his  lessons  by  reading  them  through  but  once. 
Louis  Lambert  bewildered  all  our  ideas.  And  Father  Hau- 
goult's  curiosity  and  impatience  to  see  this  new  boy  added 
fuel  to  our  excited  fancy. 

"If  he  has  pigeons,  he  can  have  no  pigeon-house;  there  is 
not  room  for  another.  Well,  it  cannot  be  helped,"  said  one 
boy,  since  famous  as  an  agriculturist. 

"Who  will  sit  next  him?"  said  another. 

"Oh,  I  wish  I  might  be  his  chum !  "  cried  an  enthusiast. 

In  school  language,  the  word  here  rendered  chum— -faisanf, 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  171 

or,  in  some  schools,  copin — expressed  a  fraternal  sharing  of 
the  joys  and  evils  of  your  childish  existence,  a  community  of 
interests  that  was  fruitful  of  squabbling  and  making  friends 
again,  a  treaty  of  alliance  offensive  and  defensive.  It  is 
strange,  but  never  in  my  time  did  I  know  brothers  who  were 
chums.  If  man  lives  by  his  feelings,  he  thinks  perhaps  that 
he  will  make  his  life  the  poorer  if  he  merges  an  affection  of 
his  own  choosing  in  a  natural  tie. 

The  impression  made  upon  me  by  Father  Haugoult's  ha- 
rangue that  evening  is  one  of  the  most  vivid  reminiscences  of 
my  childhood  ;  I  can  compare  it  with  nothing  but  my  first 
reading  of  "  Robinson  Crusoe."  Indeed,  I  owe  to  my  recol- 
lection of  these  prodigious  impressions  an  observation  that 
may  perhaps  be  new  as  to  the  different  sense  attached  to 
words  by  each  hearer.  The  word  in  itself  has  no  final  mean- 
ing ;  we  affect  a  word  more  than  it  affects  us ;  its  value  is  in 
relation  to  the  images  we  have  assimilated  and  grouped  round 
it ;  but  a  study  of  this  fact  would  require  considerable  elabora- 
tion, and  lead  us  too  far  from  our  immediate  subject. 

Not  being  able  to  sleep,  I  had  a  long  discussion  with  my 
next  neighbor  in  the  dormitory  as  to  the  remarkable  being 
who  on  the  morrow  was  to  be  one  of  us.  This  neighbor,  who 
became  an  officer,  and  is  now  a  writer  with  lofty  philosophical 
views,  Barchou  de  Penhoep,  has  not  been  false  to  his  predes- 
tination, nor  to  the  hazard  of  fortune  by  which  the  only  two 
scholars  of  Vendome,  of  whose  fame  Vendome  ever  hears, 
were  brought  together  in  the  same  class-room,  on  the  same 
form,  and  under  the  same  roof.  Our  comrade  Dufaure  had 
not,  when  this  book  was  published,  made  his  appearance  in 
public  life  as  a  lawyer.  The  translator  of  Fichte,  the  ex- 
positor and  friend  of  Ballanche,  was  already  interested,  as  I 
myself  was,  in  metaphysical  questions ;  we  often  talked  non- 
sense together  about  God,  ourselves,  and  nature.  He  at  that 
time  affected  pyrrhonism.  Jealous  of  his  place  as  leader,  he 
doubted  Lambert's  precocious  gifts;  while  I,  having  lately  read 


172  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

"Les  Enfants  celebres,"  overwhelmed  him  with  evidence, 
quoting  young  Montcalm,  Pico  della  Mirandola,  Pascal — in 
short,  a  score  of  early  developed  brains,  anomalies  that  are 
famous  in  the  history  of  the  human  mind,  and  Lambert's 
predecessors. 

I  was  at  the  time  passionately  addicted  to  reading.  My 
father,  who  was  ambitious  to  see  me  in  the  Ecole  Polytech- 
nique,  paid  for  me  to  have  a  special  course  of  private  lessons 
in  mathematics.  My  mathematical  master  was  the  librarian  of 
the  college,  and  allowed  me  to  help  myself  to  books  without 
much  caring  what  I  chose  to  take  from  the  library,  a  quiet 
spot  where  I  went  to  him  during  play-hours  to  have  my  lesson. 
Either  he  was  no  great  mathematician,  or  he  was  absorbed  in 
some  grand  scheme,  for  he  very  willingly  left  me  to  read  when 
I  ought  to  have  been  learning,  while  he  worked  at  I  knew  not 
what.  So,  by  a  tacit  understanding  between  us,  I  made  no 
complaints  of  being  taught  nothing,  and  he  said  nothing  of 
the  books  I  borrowed. 

Carried  away  by  this  ill-timed  mania,  I  neglected  my  studies 
to  compose  poems,  which  certainly  can  have  shown  no  great 
promise,  to  judge  by  a  line  of  too  many  feet  which  became 
famous  among  my  companions — the  beginning  of  an  epic  on 

the  Incas — 

"O  Inca!  O  roi  infortun6  et  malheureux !  " 

In  derision  of  such  attempts,  I  was  nicknamed  the  Poet, 
but  mockery  did  not  cure  me.  I  was  always  rhyming,  but  in 
spite  of  good  advice  from  Monsieur  Mareschal,  the  head- 
master, who  tried  to  cure  me  of  an  unfortunately  inveterate 
passion  by  telling  me  the  fable  of  a  linnet  that  fell  out  of  the 
nest  because  it  tried  to  fly  before  its  wings  were  grown.  I 
persisted  in  my  reading;  I  became  the  least  emulous,  the 
idlest,  the  most  dreamy  of  all  the  division  of  "little  boys," 
and  consequently  the  most  frequently  punished. 

This  autobiographical  digression  may  give  some  idea  of  the 
reflections  I  was  led  to  make  in  anticipation  of  Lambert's 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  173 

arrival.  I  was  then  twelve  years  old.  I  felt  sympathy  from 
the  first  for  the  boy  whose  temperament  had  some  points  of 
likeness  to  my  own.  I  was  at  last  to  have  a  companion  in 
day-dreams  and  meditations.  Though  I  knew  not  yet  what 
glory  meant,  I  thought  it  glory  to  be  the  familiar  friend  of  a 
child  whose  immortality  was  foreseen  by  Madame  de  Stael. 
To  me  Louis  Lambert  was  as  a  giant. 

The  looked-for  morrow  came  at  last.  A  minute  before 
breakfast  we  heard  the  steps  of  Monsieur  Mareschal  and  of 
the  new  boy  in  the  quiet  courtyard.  Every  head  was  turned 
at  once  to  the  door  of  the  class-room.  Father  Haugoult,  who 
participated  in  our  torments  of  curiosity,  did  not  sound  the 
whistle  he  used  to  reduce  our  mutterings  to  silence  and  bring 
us  back  to  our  tasks.  We  then  saw  this  famous  new  boy, 
whom  Monsieur  Mareschal  was  leading  by  the  hand.  The 
superintendent  descended  from  his  desk,  and  the  headmaster 
said  to  him  solemnly,  according  to  etiquette:  "Monsieur, 
I  have  brought  you  Monsieur  Louis  Lambert ;  will  you  place 
him  in  the  fourth  class,  he  will  begin  work  to-morrow." 

Then,  after  speaking  a  few  words  in  an  undertone  to  the 
class-master,  he  said — 

"Where  can  he  sit?" 

It  would  have  been  unfair  to  displace  one  of  us  for  a  new- 
comer ;  so  as  there  was  but  one  desk  vacant,  Louis  Lambert 
came  to  fill  it,  next  to  me,  for  I  had  last  joined  the  class. 
Though  we  still  had  some  time  to  wait  before  lessons  were 
over,  we  all  stood  up  to  look  at  Louis  Lambert.  Monsieur 
Mareschal  heard  our  mutterings,  saw  how  eager  we  were,  and 
said,  with  the  kindness  that  endeared  him  to  us  all — 

"  Well,  well,  but  make  no  noise ;  do  not  disturb  the  other 
classes." 

These  words  set  us  free  to  play  some  little  time  before 
breakfast,  and  we  all  gathered  round  Lambert  while  Monsieur 
Mareschal  walked  up  and  down  the  courtyard  with  Father 
Haugoult. 


174  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

There  were  about  eighty  of  us  little  demons,  as  bold  as 
birds  of  prey.  Though  we  ourselves  had  all  gone  through 
this  cruel  novitiate,  we  showed  no  mercy  on  a  new-comer, 
never  sparing  him  the  mockery,  the  catechism,  the  imperti- 
nence, which  were  inexhaustible  on  such  occasions,  to  the 
discomfiture  of  the  neophyte,  whose  manners,  strength,  and 
temper  were  thus  tested.  Lambert,  whether  he  was  stoical 
or  dumfounded,  made  no  reply  to  any  questions.  One  of  us 
thereupon  remarked  that  he  was  no  doubt  of  the  school  of 
Pythagoras,  and  there  was  a  shout  of  laughter.  The  new  boy 
was  thenceforth  Pythagoras  through  all  his  life  at  the  college. 
At  the  same  time,  Lambert's  piercing  eye,  the  scorn  expressed 
in  his  face  for  our  childishness,  so  far  removed  from  the  stamp 
of  his  own  nature,  the  easy  attitude  he  assumed,  and  his  evi- 
dent strength  in  proportion  to  his  years,  infused  a  certain  re- 
spect into  the  veriest  scamps  among  us.  For  my  part,  I  kept 
near  him,  absorbed  in  studying  him  in  silence. 

Louis  Lambert  was  slightly  built,  nearly  five  feet  in  height ; 
his  face  was  tanned,  and  his  hands  were  burnt  brown  by  the 
sun,  giving  him  an  appearance  of  manly  vigor,  which,  in  fact, 
he  did  not  possess.  Indeed,  two  months  after  he  came  to  the 
college,  when  study  in  the  class-room  had  faded  his  vivid,  so 
to  speak,  vegetable  coloring,  he  became  as  pale  and  white  as  a 
woman. 

His  head  was  unusually  large.  His  hair,  of  a  fine,  bright 
black  in  masses  of  curls,  gave  wonderful  beauty  to  his  brow, 
of  which  the  proportions  were  extraordinary  even  to  us  heed- 
less boys,  knowing  nothing,  as  may  be  supposed,  of  the 
auguries  of  phrenology,  a  science  still  in  its  cradle.  The  dis- 
tinction of  this  prophetic  brow  lay  principally  in  the  exquisitely 
chiseled  shape  of  the  arches  under  which  his  black  eyes 
sparkled,  and  which  had  the  transparency  of  alabaster,  the 
line  having  the  unusual  beauty  of  being  perfectly  level  to 
where  it  met  the  top  of  the  nose.  But  when  you  saw  his  eyes 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  175 

it  was  difficult  to  think  of  the  rest  of  his  face,  which  was 
indeed  plain  enough,  for  their  look  was  full  of  a  wonderful 
variety  of  expression ;  they  seemed  to  have  a  soul  in  their 
depths.  At  one  moment  astonishingly  clear  and  piercing,  at 
another  full  of  heavenly  sweetness,  those  eyes  became  dull, 
almost  colorless,  as  it  seemed,  when  he  was  lost  in  meditation. 
They  then  looked  like  a  window  from  which  the  sun  had 
suddenly  vanished  after  lighting  it  up.  His  strength  and  his 
voice  were  no  less  variable ;  equally  rigid,  equally  unexpected. 
His  tone  could  be  as  sweet  as  that  of  a  woman  compelled  to 
own  her  love ;  at  other  times  it  was  labored,  rough,  rugged, 
if  I  may  use  such  words  in  a  new  sense.  As  to  his  strength, 
he  was  habitually  incapable  of  enduring  the  fatigue  of  any 
game,  and  seemed  weakly,  almost  infirm.  But  during  the 
early  days  of  his  school-life,  one  of  our  little  bullies  having 
made  game  of  this  sickliness,  which  rendered  him  unfit  for 
the  violent  exercise  in  vogue  among  his  fellows,  Lambert 
took  hold  with  both  hands  of  one  of  the  class-tables,  consist- 
ing of  twelve  large  desks,  face  to  face  and  sloping  from  the 
middle;  he  leaned  back  against  the  class-master's  desk, 
steadying  the  table  with  his  feet  on  the  cross-bar,  below,  and 
said — 

"  Now,  ten  of  you  try  to  move  it !  " 

I  was  present,  and  can  vouch  for  this  strange  display  of 
strength  ;  it  was  impossible  to  move  the  table. 

Lambert  had  the  gift  of  summoning  to  his  aid  at  certain 
times  the  most  extraordinary  powers,  and  of  concentrating  all 
his  forces  on  a  given  point.  But  children,  like  men,  are  wont 
to  judge  of  everything  by  first  impressions,  and  after  the  first 
few  days  we  ceased  to  study  Louis  ;  he  entirely  belied  Madame 
de  StaeTs  prognostications,  and  displayed  none  of  the  prod- 
igies we  looked  for  in  him. 

After  three  months  at  school,  Louis  was  looked  upon  as  a 
quite  ordinary  scholar.  I  alone  was  allowed  really  to  know 
that  sublime — why  should  I  not  say  divine  ? — soul,  for  what 


176  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

is  nearer  to  God  than  genius  in  the  heart  of  a  child  ?  The 
similarity  of  our  tastes  and  ideas  made  us  friends  and  chums ; 
our  intimacy  was  so  brotherly  that  our  school-fellows  joined 
our  two  names ;  one  was  never  spoken  without  the  other,  and 
to  call  either  they  always  shouted  "  Poet-and-Pythagoras !  " 
Some  other  names  had  been  known  coupled  in  a  like  manner. 
Thus  for  two  years  I  was  the  school  friend  of  poor  Louis 
Lambert;  and  during  that  time  my  life  was  so  identified 
with  his,  that  I  am  enabled  now  to  write  his  intellectual 
biography. 

It  was  long  before  I  fully  knew  the  poetry  and  the  wealth 
of  ideas  that  lay  hidden  in  my  companion's  heart  and  brain. 
It  was  not  till  I  was  thirty  years  of  age,  till  my  experience 
was  matured  and  condensed,  till  the  flash  of  an  intense  illumin- 
ation had  thrown  a  fresh  light  upon  it,  that  I  was  capable  of 
understanding  all  the  bearings  of  the  phenomena  which  I  wit- 
nessed at  that  early  time.  I  benefited  by  them  without  un- 
derstanding their  greatness  or  their  processes  ;  indeed,  I  have 
forgotten  some,  or  remember  only  the  most  conspicuous  facts ; 
still,  my  memory  is  now  able  to  coordinate  them,  and  I  have 
mastered  the  secrets  of  that  fertile  brain  by  looking  back  to 
the  delightful  days  of  our  boyish  affection.  So  it  was  time 
alone  that  initiated  me  into  the  meaning  of  the  events 
and  facts  that  were  crowded  into  that  obscure  life,  as  into 
that  of  many  another  man  who  is  lost  to  science.  Indeed, 
this  narrative,  so  far  as  the  expression  and  appreciation  of 
many  things  is  concerned,  will  be  found  full  of  what  may  be 
termed  moral  anachronisms,  which  perhaps  will  not  detract 
from  its  peculiar  interest. 

In  the  course  of  the  first  few  months  after  coming  to  Ven- 
dome,  Louis  became  the  victim  of  a  malady  which,  though 
the  symptoms  were  invisible  to  the  eyes  of  our  superiors,  con- 
siderably interfered  with  the  exercise  of  his  remarkable  gifts. 
Accustomed  to  live  in  the  open  air  and  to  the  freedom  of  a 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  177 

purely  haphazard  education,  happy  in  the  tender  care  of  an 
old  man  who  was  devoted  to  him,  used  to  meditating  in  the 
sunshine,  he  found  it  very  hard  to  submit  to  college  rules,  to 
walk  in  the  ranks,  to  live  within  the  four  walls  of  a  room 
where  eighty  boys  were  sitting  in  silence  on  wooden  forms, 
each  in  front  of  his  desk.  His  senses  were  developed  to  such 
perfection  as  gave  them  the  most  sensitive  keenness,  and  every 
part  of  him  suffered  from  this  life  in  common. 

The  effluvia  that  vitiated  the  air,  mingled  with  the  odors  of 
a  class-room  that  was  never  clean  or  free  from  the  fragments 
of  our  breakfasts  or  little  lunches,  affected  his  sense  of  smell, 
the  sense  which,  being  more  immediately  connected  than  the 
others  with  the  nerve-centres  of  the  brain,  must,  when  shocked, 
cause  invisible  disturbance  to  the  organs  of  thought. 

Beside  these  elements  of  impurity  in  the  atmosphere,  there 
were  lockers  in  the  class-rooms  in  which  the  boys  kept  their 
miscellaneous  plunder — pigeons  killed  for  fete  days,  or  titbits 
filched  from  the  dinner-table.  In  each  class-room,  too,  there 
was  a  large  stone  slab,  on  which  two  pails  full  of  water  were 
kept  standing,  a  sort  of  sink,  where  we  every  morning  washed 
our  faces  and  hands,  one  after  another,  in  the  master's  pres- 
ence. We  then  passed  on  to  a  table,  where  women  combed 
and  powdered  our  hair.  Thus  the  place,  being  cleaned  but 
once  a  day  before  we  were  up,  was  always  more  or  less  dirty. 
In  spite  of  numerous  windows  and  lofty  doors,  the  air  was 
constantly  fouled  by  the  smells  from  the  washing-place,  the 
hairdressing,  the  lockers,  and  the  thousand  messes  made  by 
the  boys,  to  say  nothing  of  their  eighty  closely  packed  bodies. 
And  this  sort  of  humus,  mingling  with  the  mud  we  brought 
in  from  the  play -ground,  produced  a  suffocatingly  pestilent 
filthiness. 

The  loss  of  the  fresh  and  fragrant  country  air  in  which  he 

had  hitherto  lived,  the  change  of  habits  and  strict  discipline, 

combined  to  depress  Lambert.     With  his  elbow  on  his  desk 

and  his  head  supported  on  his  left  hand,  he  spent  the  hours 

12 


178  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

of  study  gazing  at  the  trees  in  the  court  or  the  clouds  in  the 
sky ;  he  seemed  to  be  thinking  of  his  lessons  ;  but  the  master, 
seeing  his  pen  motionless,  or  the  sheet  before  him  still  a 
blank,  would  call  out — 

"  Lambert,  you  are  doing  nothing  !  " 

This  "you  are  doing  nothing!"  was  a  pin-thrust  that 
wounded  Louis  to  the  quick.  And  then  he  never  earned  the 
rest  of  recess ;  he  always  had  impositions  to  write.  The  im- 
position, a  punishment  which  varies  according  to  the  prac- 
tice of  different  schools,  consisted  at  Vendome  of  a  certain 
number  of  lines  to  be  written  out  in  play-hours.  Lambert 
and  I  were  so  overpowered  with  impositions  that  we  had  not 
six  free  days  during  the  two  years  of  our  school  friendship. 
But  for  the  books  we  took  out  of  the  library,  which  main- 
tained some  vitality  in  our  brains,  this  system  of  discipline 
would  have  reduced  us  to  idiocy.  Want  of  exercise  is  fatal 
to  children.  The  habit  of  preserving  a  dignified  appearance, 
begun  in  tender  infancy,  has,  it  is  said,  a  visible  effect  on  the 
constitution  of  royal  personages  when  the  faults  of  such  an 
education  are  not  counteracted  by  the  life  of  the  battlefield  or 
the  laborious  sport  of  hunting.  And  if  the  laws  of  etiquette 
and  Court  manners  can  act  on  the  spinal  marrow  to  such  an 
extent  as  to  affect  the  pelvis  of  kings,  to  soften  their  cerebral 
tissue,  and  so  degenerate  the  race,  what  deep-seated  mischief, 
physical  and  moral,  must  result  in  schoolboys  from  the  con- 
stant lack  of  air,  exercise,  and  cheerfulness  ! 

Indeed,  the  rules  of  punishment  carried  out  in  schools  de- 
serve the  attention  of  the  office  of  public  instruction  when  any 
thinkers  are  to  be  found  there  who  do  not  think  exclusively 
of  themselves. 

We  incurred  the  infliction  of  an  imposition  in  a  thousand 
ways.  Our  memory  was  so  good  that  we  never  learned  a 
lesson.  It  was  enough  for  either  of  us  to  hear  our  class-fellows 
repeat  the  task  in  French,  Latin,  or  grammar,  and  we  could 
say  it  when  our  turn  came ;  but  if  the  master,  unfortunately, 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  179 

took  it  into  his  head  to  reverse  the  usual  order  and  call  upon 
us  first,  we  very  often  did  not  even  know  what  the  lesson  was; 
then  the  imposition  fell  in  spite  of  our  most  ingenious  excuses. 
Then  we  always  put  off  writing  our  exercises  till  the  last 
moment;  if  there  were  a  book  to  be  finished,  or  if  we  were 
lost  in  thought,  the  task  was  forgotten — again  an  imposition. 
How  often  have  we  scribbled  an  exercise  during  the  time 
when  the  head-boy,  whose  business  it  was  to  collect  them 
when  we  came  into  school,  was  gathering  them  from  the 
others  ! 

In  addition  to  the  moral  misery  which  Lambert  went  through 
in  trying  to  acclimatize  himself  to  college  life,  there  was  a 
scarcely  less  cruel  apprenticeship  through  which  every  boy 
had  to  pass :  to  those  bodily  sufferings  which  seemed  infinitely 
varied.  The  tenderness  of  a  child's  skin  needs  extreme  care, 
especially  in  winter,  when  a  schoolboy  is  constantly  ex- 
changing the  frozen  air  of  the  muddy  playing-yard  for  the 
stuffy  atmosphere  of  the  class-room.  The  "little  boys"  and 
the  smallest  of  all,  for  lack  of  a  mother's  care,  were  martyrs 
to  chilblains  and  chaps  so  severe  that  they  had  to  be  regularly 
dressed  during  the  breakfast  hour;  but  this  could  only  be 
very  indifferently  done  to  so  many  damaged  hands,  toes,  and 
heels.  A  good  many  of  the  boys  indeed  were  obliged  to  pre- 
fer the  evil  to  the  remedy ;  the  choice  constantly  lay  between 
their  lessons  waiting  to  be  finished  or  the  joys  of  a  slide,  and 
waiting  for  a  bandage  carelessly  put  on,  and  still  more  care- 
lessly cast  off  again.  Also  it  was  the  fashion  in  the  school  to 
gibe  at  the  poor,  feeble  creatures  who  went  to  be  doctored ; 
the  bullies  vied  with  each  other  in  snatching  off  the  rags 
which  the  infirmary  nurse  had  tied  on.  Hence,  in  winter, 
many  of  us,  with  half-dead  feet  and  fingers,  sick  with  pain, 
were  incapable  of  work,  and  punished  for  not  working.  The 
fathers,  too  often  deluded  by  shammed  ailments,  would  not 
believe  in  real  suffering. 

The  price  paid  for  our  schooling  and  board  also  covered 


180  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

the  cost  of  clothing.*  The  committee  contracted  for  the  shoes 
and  clothes  supplied  to  the  boys;  hence  the  weekly  inspection 
of  which  I  have  spoken.  This  plan,  though  admirable  for 
the  manager,  is  always  disastrous  to  the  managed.  Woe  to 
the  boy  who  indulged  in  the  bad  habit  of  treading  his  shoes 
down  at  neel,  of  cracking  the  shoe-leather,  or  wearing  out 
the  soles  too  fast,  whether  from  a  defect  in  his  gait,  or  by 
fidgeting  during  lessons  in  obedience  to  the  instinctive  need 
of  movement  common  to  all  children.  That  boy  did  not  get 
through  the  winter  without  great  suffering.  In  the  first  place, 
his  chilblains  would  ache  and  shoot  as  badly  as  a  fit  of  the 
gout;  then  the  rivets  and  wax-thread  intended  to  repair  the 
shoes  would  give  way,  or  the  broken  heels  would  prevent  the 
wretched  shoes  from  keeping  on  his  feet ;  he  was  obliged  to 
drag  them  wearily  along  the  frozen  roads,  or  sometimes  to 
dispute  their  possession  with  the  clay  soil  of  the  district ;  the 
water  and  snow  got  in  through  some  unnoticed  crack  or  ill- 
sewn  patch,  and  the  foot  would  swell. 

Out  of  sixty  boys,  not  ten  perhaps  could  walk  without  some 
special  form  of  torture,  and  yet  they  all  kept  up  with  the  body 
of  the  troop,  dragged  on  by  the  general  movement,  as  men 
are  driven  through  life  by  life  itself.  Many  a  time  some 
proud-tempered  boy  would  shed  tears  of  rage  while  summoning 
his  remaining  energy  to  run  ahead  and  get  home  again  in 
spite  of  pain,  so  sensitively  afraid  of  laughter  or  of  pity — two 
forms  of  scorn — is  the  still  tender  soul  at  that  age. 

At  school,  as  in  social  life,  the  strong  despise  the  feeble 
without  knowing  in  what  true  strength  consists. 

Nor  was  this  all.  No  gloves.  If  by  good  hap  a  boy's 
parents,  the  infirmary  nurse,  or  the  headmaster  gave  gloves  to 
a  particularly  delicate  lad,  the  wags  or  the  big  boys  of  the 
class  would  put  them  on  the  stove,  amused  to  see  them  dry 
and  shrivel ;  or  if  the  gloves  escaped  the  marauders,  after 
getting  wet  they  shrunk  as  they  dried  for  want  of  care.  No, 
*  This  still  obtains  in  the  cheaper  pensions  or  boarding-schools. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  181 

gloves  were  impossible.  Gloves  were  a  privilege,  and  boys 
ever  did  and  ever  will  insist  on  equality,  especially  in  schools 
and  colleges. 

Louis  Lambert  fell  a  victim  to  all  these  varieties  of  torment. 
Like  many  contemplative  men,  who,  when  lost  in  thought, 
acquire  a  habit  of  mechanical  motion,  he  had  a  mania  for 
fidgeting  with  his  shoes,  and  destroyed  them  very  quickly. 
His  girlish  complexion,  the  skin  of  his  ears  and  lips,  cracked 
with  the  least  cold.  His  soft,  white  hands  grew  red  and 
swollen.  He  had  perpetual  colds.  Thus  he  was  a  constant 
sufferer  till  he  became  inured  to  school-life.  Taught  at  last  by 
cruel  experience,  he  was  obliged  to  "  look  after  his  things," 
to  use  the  school  phrase.  He  was  forced  to  take  care  of  his 
locker,  his  desk,  his  clothes,  his  shoes ;  to  protect  his  ink,  his 
books,  his  copy-paper,  and  his  pens  from  pilferers;  in  short, 
to  give  his  mind  to  the  thousand  details  of  our  trivial  life,  to 
which  more  selfish  and  commonplace  minds  devoted  such 
strict  attention — thus  infallibly  securing  prizes  for  "  profi- 
ciency"  and  "good  conduct" — while  they  were  overlooked 
by  a  boy  of  the  highest  promise,  who,  under  the  hand  of  an 
almost  divine  imagination,  gave  himself  up  with  rapture  to  the 
flow  of  his  ideas. 

This  was  not  all.  There  is  a  perpetual  struggle  going  on 
between  the  masters  and  the  boys,  a  struggle  without  truce,  to 
be  compared  with  nothing  else  in  the  social  world,  unless  it  be 
the  resistance  of  the  opposition  to  the  ministry  in  a  represen- 
tative government.  But  journalists  and  opposition  speakers 
are  probably  less  prompt  to  take  advantage  of  a  weak  point, 
less  extreme  in  resenting  an  injury,  and  less  merciless  in  their 
mockery  than  boys  are  in  regard  to  those  who  rule  over  them. 
It  is  a  task  to  put  angels  out  of  patience.  An  unhappy  class- 
master  must  then  not  be  too  severely  blamed,  ill-paid  as  he 
is,  and  consequently  not  too  competent,  if  he  is  occasionally 
unjust  or  out  of  temper.  Perpetually  watched  by  a  hundred 
mocking  eyes,  and  surrounded  with  snares,  he  sometimes 


182  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

revenges  himself  for  his  own  blunders  on  the  boys  who  are 
only  too  ready  to  detect  them. 

Unless  for  serious  misdemeanors,  for  which  there  were  other 
forms  of  punishment,  the  strap  was  regarded  at  Vendome  as 
the  ultima  ratio  Patrum.  Exercises  forgotten,  lessons  ill 
learned,  common  ill  behavior  were  sufficiently  punished  by  an 
imposition,  but  offended  dignity  spoke  in  the  master  through 
the  strap.  Of  all  the  physical  torments  to  which  we  were 
exposed,  certainly  the  most  acute  was  that  inflicted  by  this 
leathern  instrument,  about  two  fingers  wide,  applied  to  our 
poor  little  hands  with  all  the  strength  and  all  the  fury  of  the 
administrator.  To  endure  this  classical  form  of  correction,  the 
victim  knelt  in  the  middle  of  the  room.  He  had  to  leave  his 
form  and  go  to  kneel  down  near  the  master's  desk  under  the 
curious  and  generally  merciless  eyes  of  his  fellows.  To  sensi- 
tive natures  these  preliminaries  were  an  introductory  torture, 
like  the  journey  from  the  Palais  de  Justice  to  the  Place  de 
Greve  which  the  condemned  used  to  make  to  the  scaffold. 

Some  boys  cried  out  and  shed  bitter  tears  before  or  after  the 
application  of  the  strap  ;  others  accepted  the  infliction  with 
stoic  calm ;  it  was  a  question  of  nature ;  but  few  could  control 
an  expression  of  anguish  in  anticipation. 

Louis  Lambert  was  constantly  enduring  the  strap,  and  owed 
it  to  a  peculiarity  of  his  physiognomy  of  which  he  was  for  a 
long  time  quite  unconscious.  Whenever  he  was  suddenly 
roused  from  a  fit  of  abstraction  by  the  master's  cry,  "You  are 
doing  nothing!  "  it  often  happened  that,  without  knowing  it, 
he  flashed  at  his  teacher  a  look  full  of  fierce  contempt,  and 
charged  with  thought,  as  a  Leyden  jar  is  charged  with  elec- 
tricity. This  look,  no  doubt,  discomfited  the  master,  who, 
indignant  at  this  unspoken  retort,  wished  to  cure  his  scholar 
of  that  thunderous  flash. 

The  first  time  the  father  took  offense  at  this  ray  of  scorn, 
which  struck  him  like  a  lightning-flash,  he  made  this  speech, 
as  I  well  remember — 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  183 

"  If  you  look  at  me  again  in  that  way,  Lambert,  you  will  get 
the  strap." 

At  these  words  every  nose  was  in  the  air,  every  eye  looked 
alternately  at  the  master  and  at  Louis.  The  observation  was 
so  utterly  foolish,  that  the  boy  again  looked  at  the  father, 
overwhelming  him  with  another  flash.  From  this  arose  a 
standing  feud  between  Lambert  and  his  master,  resulting  in  a 
certain  amount  of  "strap."  Thus  did  he  first  discover  the 
power  of  his  eye. 

The  hapless  poet,  so  full  of  nerves,  as  sensitive  as  a  woman, 
under  the  sway  of  chronic  melancholy,  and  as  sick  with  genius 
as  a  girl  with  love  that  she  pines  for,  knowing  nothing  of  it; 
this  boy,  at  once  so  powerful  and  so  weak,  transplanted  by 
"  Corinne  "  from  the  country  he  loved,  to  be  squeezed  in  the 
mould  of  a  collegiate  routine  to  which  every  spirit  and  every 
body  must  yield,  whatever  their  range  or  temperament,  accept- 
ing its  rule  and  its  uniform  as  gold  is  crushed  into  round  coin 
under  the  press ;  Louis  Lambert  suffered  in  every  spot  where 
pain  can  touch  the  soul  or  the  flesh.  Stuck  on  a  form,  re- 
stricted to  the  acreage  of  his  desk,  a  victim  to  the  strap  and 
to  a  sickly  frame,  tortured  in  every  sense,  environed  by  dis- 
tress— everything  compelled  him  to  give  his  body  up  to  the 
myriad  tyrannies  of  school-life;  and,  like  the  martyrs  who 
smiled  in  the  midst  of  suffering,  he  took  refuge  in  heaven, 
which  lay  open  to  his  mind.  Perhaps  this  life  of  purely  in- 
ward emotions  helped  him  to  see  something  of  the  mysteries 
he  so  entirely  believed  in  ! 

Our  independence,  our  illicit  amusements,  our  apparent 
waste  of  time,  our  persistent  indifference,  our  frequent  punish- 
ments and  aversion  for  our  exercises  and  impositions,  earned 
us  a  reputation,  which  no  one  cared  to  controvert,  for  being 
an  idle  and  incorrigible  pair.  Our  masters  treated  us  with 
contempt,  and  we  fell  into  utter  disgrace  with,  our  compan- 
ions, from  whom  we  concealed  our  secret  studies  for  fear  of 
being  laughed  at.  This  hard  judgment,  which  was  injustice 


184  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

in  the  masters,  was  but  natural  in  our  school-fellows.  We 
could  neither  play  ball,  nor  run  races,  nor  walk  on  stilts.  On 
exceptional  holidays,  when  amnesty  was  proclaimed  and  we 
got  a  few  hours  of  freedom,  we  shared  in  none  of  the  popular 
diversions  of  the  school.  Aliens  from  the  pleasures  enjoyed 
by  the  others,  we  were  outcasts,  sitting  forlorn  under  a  tree  in 
the  play-ground.  The  Poet-and-Pythagoras  formed  an  ex- 
ception and  led  a  life  apart  from  the  life  of  the  rest. 

The  penetrating  instinct  and  unerring  conceit  of  schoolboys 
made  them  feel  that  we  were  of  a  nature  either  far  above  or  far 
beneath  their  own ;  hence  some  simply  hated  our  aristocratic 
reserve,  others  merely  scorned  our  ineptitude.  These  feelings 
were  equally  shared  by  us  without  our  knowing  it ;  perhaps  I 
have  but  now  divined  them.  We  lived  exactly  like  two  rats, 
huddled  into  the  corner  of  the  room  where  our  desks  were, 
sitting  there  alike  during  lesson-time  and  play-hours.  This 
strange  state  of  affairs  inevitably  and  in  fact  placed  us  on  a 
footing  of  war  with  all  the  other  boys  in  our  division.  For- 
gotten for  the  most  part,  we  sat  there  very  contentedly ;  half 
happy,  like  two  plants,  two  images  who  would  have  been 
missed  from  the  furniture  of  the  room.  But  the  most  aggres- 
sive of  our  school-fellows  would  sometimes  torment  us,  just  to 
show  their  malignant  power,  and  we  responded  with  stolid 
contempt,  which  brought  many  a  thrashing  down  on  the  Poet- 
and-Pythagoras. 

Lambert's  home-sickness  lasted  for  many  months.  I  know 
no  words  to  describe  the  dejection  to  which  he  was  a  prey. 
Louis  has  taken  the  glory  off  many  a  masterpiece  for  me.  We 
had  both  played  the  part  of  the  "Leper  of  Aosta,"  and  had 
both  experienced  the  feelings  described  in  Monsieur  de 
Maistre's  story,  before  we  read  them  as  expressed  by  his  elo- 
quent pen.  A  book  may,  indeed,  revive  the  memories  of  our 
childhood,  but  it  can  never  compete  with  them  successfully. 
Lambert's  woes  had  taught  me  many  a  chant  of  sorrow  far 
more  appealing  than  the  finest  passages  in  "  Werther."  And, 


LOUIS  LAMBERT,  185 

indeed,  there  is  no  possible  comparison  between  the  pangs  of 
a  passion  condemned,  whether  rightly  or  wrongly,  by  every 
law,  and  the  grief  of  a  poor  child  pining  for  the  glorious  sun- 
shine, the  dews  of  the  valley,  and  liberty.  Werther  is  the 
slave  of  desire  :  Louis  Lambert  was  an  enslaved  soul.  Given 
equal  talent,  the  more  pathetic  sorrow,  founded  on  desires 
which,  being  purer,  are  the  more  genuine,  must  transcend  the 
wail  even  of  genius. 

After  sitting  for  a  long  time  with  his  eyes  fixed  on  a  lime- 
tree  in  the  play-ground,  Louis  would  say  just  a  word  ;  but  that 
word  would  reveal  an  infinite  speculation. 

"  Happily  for  me,"  he  exclaimed  one  day,  "  there  are  hours 
of  comfort  when  I  feel  as  though  the  walls  of  the  room  had 
fallen  and  I  were  away — away  in  the  fields !  What  a  pleasure 
it  is  to  let  one's  self  go  on  the  stream  of  one's  thoughts  as  a  bird 
is  borne  up  on  its  wings  ! 

"  Why  is  green  a  color  so  largely  diffused  throughout  crea- 
tion ?  "  he  would  ask  me.  "Why  are  there  so  few  straight  lines 
in  nature?  Why  is  it  that  man,  in  his  structures,  rarely  in- 
troduces curves  ?  Why  is  it  that  he  alone,  of  all  creatures, 
has  a  sense  of  straightness?" 

These  queries  revealed  long  excursions  in  space.  He  had, 
I  am  sure,  seen  vast  landscapes  fragrant  with  the  scent  of 
woods.  He  was  always  silent  and  resigned,  a  living  elegy, 
always  suffering  but  unable  to  complain  of  suffering.  An  eagle 
that  needed  the  world  to  feed  him,  shut  in  between  four  nar- 
row, dirty  walls ;  and  thus  his  life  became  an  ideal  life  in  the 
strictest  meaning  of  the  words.  Filled  as  he  was  with  con- 
tempt of  the  almost  useless  studies  to  which  we  were  harnessed, 
Louis  went  on  his  skyward  way  absolutely  unconscious  of  the 
things  about  us. 

I,  obeying  the  imitative  instinct  that  is  so  strong  in  child- 
hood, tried  to  regulate  my  life  in  conformity  with  his.  And 
Louis  the  more  easily  infected  me  with  the  sort  of  torpor  in  which 
deep  contemplation  leaves  the  body,  because  I  was  younger 


186  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

and  more  impressionable  than  he.  Like  two  lovers,  we  got  into 
the  habit  of  thinking  together  in  a  common  reverie.  His  in- 
tuitions had  already  acquired  that  acuteness  which  must  surely 
characterize  the  intellectual  perceptiveness  of  great  poets  and 
often  bring  them  to  the  verge  of  madness. 

"Do  you  ever  feel,"  said  he  to  me  one  day,  "as  though 
imagined  suffering  affected  you  in  spite  of  yourself?  If,  for 
instance,  I  think  with  concentration  of  the  effect  that  the 
blade  of  my  penknife  would  have  in  piercing  my  flesh,  I  feel 
an  acute  pain  as  if  I  had  really  cut  myself;  only  the  blood  is 
wanting.  But  the  pain  comes  suddenly,  and  startles  me  like 
a  sharp  noise  breaking  profound  silence.  Can  an  idea  cause 
physical  pain  !  What  do  you  say  to  that,  eh?" 

When  he  gave  utterance  to  such  subtle  reflections,  we  both 
fell  into  artless  meditation  ;  we  set  to  work  to  detect  in  our- 
selves the  inscrutable  phenomena  of  the  origin  of  thoughts, 
which  Lambert  hoped  to  discover  in  their  earliest  germ,  so  as 
to  describe  some  day  the  unknown  process.  Then,  after 
much  discussion,  often  mixed  up  with  childish  notions,  a  look 
would  flash  from  Lambert's  eager  eyes ;  he  would  grasp  my 
hand,  and  a  word  from  the  depths  of  his  soul  would  show  the 
current  of  his  mind. 

"Thinking  is  seeing,"  said  he  one  day,  carried  away  by 
some  objection  raised  as  to  the  first  principles  of  our  organiza- 
tion. "  Every  human  science  is  based  on  deduction,  which 
is  a  slow  process  of  seeing  by  which  we  work  up  from  the 
effect  to  the  cause ;  or,  in  a  wider  sense,  all  poetry,  like  every 
work  of  art,  proceeds  from  a  swift  vision  of  things." 

He  was  a  spiritualist  (as  opposed  to  materialism) ;  but  I 
would  venture  to  contradict  him,  using  his  own  arguments  to 
consider  the  intellect  as  a  purely  physical  phenomenon.  We 
both  were  right.  Perhaps  the  words  materialism  and  spiritu- 
alism express  the  two  faces  of  the  same  fact.  His  considera- 
tions on  the  substance  of  the  mind  led  to  his  accepting,  with 
a  certain  pride,  the  life  of  privation  to  which  we  were  con- 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  187 

demned  in  consequence  of  our  idleness  and  our  indifference 
to  learning.  He  had  a  certain  consciousness  of  his  own 
powers  which  bore  him  up  through  his  spiritual  cogitations. 
How  delightful  it  was  to  me  to  feel  his  soul  acting  on  my  own  ! 
Many  a  time  have  we  remained  sitting  on  our  form,  both 
buried  in  one  book,  having  quite  forgotten  each  other's  ex- 
istence, and  yet  not  apart;  each  conscious  of  the  other's 
presence,  and  bathing  in  an  ocean  of  thought,  like  two  fish 
swimming  in  the  same  waters. 

Our  life,  apparently,  was  merely  vegetating ;  but  we  lived 
through  our  heart  and  brain. 

Lambert's  influence  over  my  imagination  left  traces  that 
still  abide.  I  used  to  listen  hungrily  to  his  tales,  full  of  the 
marvels  which  make  men,  as  well  as  children,  rapturously 
devour  stories  in  which  truth  assumes  the  most  grotesque 
forms.  His  passion  for  mystery,  and  the  credulity  natural  to 
the  young,  often  led  us  to  discuss  Heaven  and  Hell.  Then 
Louis,  by  expounding  Swedenborg,  would  try  to  make  me 
share  in  his  beliefs  concerning  angels.  In  his  least  logical 
arguments  there  were  still  amazing  observations  as  to  the 
powers  of  man,  which  gave  his  words  that  color  of  truth  with- 
out which  nothing  can  be  done  in  any  art.  The  romantic 
end  he  foresaw  as  the  destiny  of  man  was  calculated  to  flatter 
the  yearning  which  tempts  blameless  imaginations  to  give 
themselves  up  to  beliefs.  Is  it  not  during  the  youth  of  a 
nation  that  its  dogmas  and  idols  are  conceived?  And  are 
not  the  supernatural  beings  before  whom  the  people  tremble 
the  personification  of  their  feelings  and  their  magnified  desires? 

All  that  I  can  now  remember  of  the  poetical  conversations 
we  held  together  concerning  the  Swedish  prophet,  whose 
works  I  have  since  had  the  curiosity  to  read,  may  be  told  in  a 
few  paragraphs. 

In  each  of  us  there  are  two  distinct  beings.  According 
to  Swedenborg,  the  angel  is  an  individual  in  whom  the  inner 


188  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

being  conquers  the  external  being.  If  a  man  desires  to  earn 
his  call  to  be  an  angel,  as  soon  as  his  mind  reveals  to  him  his 
twofold  existence,  he  must  strive  to  foster  the  delicate  angelic 
essence  that  exists  within  him.  If,  for  lack  of  a  lucid  appre- 
ciation of  his  destiny,  he  allows  bodily  action  to  predominate, 
instead  of  confirming  his  intellectual  being,  all  his  powers  will 
be  absorbed  in  the  use  of  his  external  senses,  and  the  angel 
will  slowly  perish  by  the  materialization  of  both  natures.  In 
the  contrary  case,  if  he  nourishes  his  inner  being  with  the 
ailment  needful  to  it,  the  soul  triumphs  over  matter  and  strives 
to  get  free. 

When  they  separate  by  the  act  of  what  we  call  death,  the 
angel,  strong  enough  then  to  cast  off  its  wrappings,  survives 
and  begins  its  real  life.  The  infinite  variety  which  differen- 
tiates individual  men  can  only  be  explained  by  this  twofold 
existence,  which,  again,  is  proved  and  made  intelligible  by 
that  variety. 

In  point  of  fact,  the  wide  distance  between  a  man  whose 
torpid  intelligence  condemns  him  to  evident  stupidity,  and 
one  who,  by  the  exercise  of  his  inner  life,  has  acquired  the 
gift  of  some  power,  allows  us  to  suppose  that  there  is  as  great 
a  difference  between  men  of  genius  and  other  beings  as  there 
is  between  the  blind  and  those  who  see.  This  hypothesis, 
since  it  extends  creation  beyond  all  limits,  gives  us,  as  it  were, 
the  clue  to  heaven.  The  beings  who,  here  on  earth,  are 
apparently  mingled  without  distinction,  are  there  distributed, 
according  to  their  inner  perfection,  in  distinct  spheres  whose 
speech  and  manners  have  nothing  in  common.  In  the  invisi- 
ble world,  as  in  the  real  world,  if  some  native  of  the  lower 
spheres  comes,  all  unworthy,  into  a  higher  sphere,  not  only 
can  he  never  understand  the  customs  and  language  there,  but 
his  mere  presence  paralyzes  the  voice  and  hearts  of  those  who 
dwell  therein. 

Dante,  in  his  "Divine  Comedy,"  had  perhaps  some  slight 
intuition  of  those  spheres  which  begin  in  the  world  of  torment, 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  189 

and  rise,  circle  on  circle,  to  the  highest  heaven.  Thus  Swed- 
enborg's  doctrine  is  the  product  of  a  lucid  spirit  noting  down 
the  innumerable  signs  by  which  the  angels  manifest  their 
presence  among  men. 

This  doctrine,  which  I  have  endeavored  to  sum  up  in  a  more 
or  less  consistent  form,  was  set  before  me  by  Lambert  with  all 
the  fascination  of  mysticism,  swathed  in  the  wrappings  of  the 
phraseology  affected  by  mystical  writers :  an  obscure  language 
ful1  of  abstractions,  and  taking  such  effect  on  the  brain,  that 
there  are  books  by  Jacob  Boshm,  Swedenborg,  and  Madame 
Guyon,  so  strangely  powerful  that  they  give  rise  to  phantasies 
as  various  as  the  dreams  of  the  opium-eater.  Lambert  told 
me  of  mystical  facts  so  extraordinary,  he  so  acted  on  my 
imagination,  that  he  made  my  brain  reel.  Still,  I  loved  to 
plunge  into  that  realm  of  mystery,  invisible  to  the  senses,  in 
which  every  one  likes  to  dwell,  whether  he  pictures  it  to  him- 
self under  the  indefinite  ideal  of  the  Future,  or  clothes  it  in 
the  more  solid  guise  of  romance.  These  violent  revulsions 
of  the  mind  on  itself  gave  me,  without  my  knowing  it,  a 
comprehension  of  its  power,  and  accustomed  me  to  the  work- 
ings of  the  mind. 

Lambert  himself  explained  everything  by  his  theory  of  the 
angels.  To  him  pure  love — love  as  we  dream  of  it  in  youth — 
was  the  coalescence  of  two  angelic  natures.  Nothing  could 
exceed  the  fervency  with  which  he  longed  to  meet  a  woman 
angel.  And  who  better  than  he  could  inspire  or  feel  love  ? 
If  anything  could  give  an  impression  of  an  exquisite  nature, 
was  it  not  the  amiability  and  kindliness  that  marked  his  feel- 
ings, his  words,  his  actions,  his  slightest  gestures,  the  conjugal 
regard  that  united  us  as  boys,  and  that  we  expressed  when  we 
called  ourselves  chums  ? 

There  was  no  distinction  for  us  between  my  ideas  and  his. 
We  imitated  each  other's  handwriting,  so  that  one  might 
write  the  tasks  of  both.  Thus,  if  one  of  us  had  a  book  to 
finish  and  to  return  to  the  mathematical  master,  he  could  read 


190  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

on  without  interruption  while  the  other  scribbled  off  his  exer- 
cise and  imposition.  We  did  our  tasks  as  though  paying  a 
debt  on  our  peace  of  mind.  If  my  memory  does  not  play  me 
false,  they  were  sometimes  of  remarkable  merit  when  Lambert 
did  them.  But  on  the  foregone  conclusion  that  we  were  both 
of  us  idiots,  the  master  always  went  through  them  under  a 
rooted  prejudice,  and  even  kept  them  to  read  to  be  laughed 
at  by  our  school-fellows. 

I  remember  one  afternoon,  at  the  end  of  the  lesson,  which 
lasted  from  two  till  four,  the  master  took  possession  of  a  page 
of  translation  by  Lambert.  The  passage  began  with,  Caius 
Gracchus,  vir nobilis ;  Lambert  had  construed  this  by"  Caius 
Gracchus  had  a  noble  heart." 

"Where  do  you  find  'heart'  in  nobilis ?"  said  the  father 
sharply. 

And  there  was  a  roar  of  laughter,  while  Lambert  looked  at 
the  master  in  some  bewilderment. 

"What  would  Madame  la  Baronne  de  Stael  say  if  she  could 
know  that  you  make  such  nonsense  of  a  word  that  means  of 
noble  family,  of  patrician  rank  ? ' ' 

"  She  would  say  that  you  were  an  ass,"  said  I  in  a  muttered 
tone. 

"  Master  Poet,  you  will  stay  in  for  a  week,"  replied  the 
master,  who  unfortunately  overheard  me. 

Lambert  simply  repeated,  looking  at  me  with  inexpressible 
affection  :  ' '  Vir  nobilis  ! ' ' 

Madame  de  Stael  was,  in  fact,  partly  the  cause  of  Lambert's 
troubles.  On  every  pretext  masters  and  pupils  threw  the 
name  in  his  teeth,  either  in  irony  or  in  reproof. 

Louis  lost  no  time  in  getting  himself  "kept  in  "  to  share 
my  imprisonment.  Freer  thus  than  in  any  other  circum- 
stances, we  could  talk  the  whole  day  long  in  the  silence  of  the 
dormitories,  where  each  boy  had  a  chamber  six  feet  square,  the 
partitions  consisting  at  the  top  of  open  bars.  The  doors, 
fitted  with  gratings,  were  locked  at  night  and  opened  in  the 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  191 

morning  under  the  eye  of  the  father  whose  duty  it  was  to 
superintend  our  rising  and  going  to  bed.  The  creak  of  these 
gates,  which  the  college  servants  unlocked  with  remarkable 
expedition,  was  a  sound  peculiar  to  that  college.  These  little 
cells  were  our  prison,  and  boys  were  sometimes  shut  up  there  for 
a  month  at  a  time.  The  boys  in  these  coops  were  under  the  stern 
eye  of  the  prefect,  a  sort  of  monitor  who  stole  up  at  certain 
hours  or  at  unexpected  moments,  with  a  silent  step,  to  hear  if  we 
were  talking  instead  of  writing  our  impositions.  But  a  few  wal- 
nut shells  dropped  on  the  stairs,  or  the  sharpness  of  our  hearing, 
almost  always  enabled  us  to  beware  of  his  coming,  so  we  could 
give  ourselves  up  without  anxiety  to  our  favorite  studies. 
However,  as  books  were  prohibited,  our  prison  hours  were 
chiefly  filled  up  with  metaphysical  discussions,  or  with  re- 
lating singular  facts  connected  with  the  astounding  phenomena 
of  mind. 

One  of  the  most  extraordinary  of  these  incidents  beyond 
question  is  this,  which  I  will  here  record,  not  only  because  it 
concerns  Lambert,  but  because  it  perhaps  was  the  turning- 
point  of  his  scientific  career.  By  the  law  of  custom  in  all 
schools,  Thursday  and  Sunday  were  holidays ;  but  the  services, 
which  we  were  made  to  attend  very  regularly,  so  completely 
filled  up  Sunday,  that  we  considered  Thursday  our  only  real 
day  of  freedom.  After  once  attending  mass,  we  had  a  long 
day  before  us  to  spend  in  walks  in  the  country  round  the  town 
of  Vendome.  The  manor  of  Rochambeau  was  the  most  in- 
teresting object  of  our  excursions,  perhaps  by  reason  of  its 
distance;  the  smaller  boys  were  very  seldom  taken  on  so 
fatiguing  an  expedition.  However,  once  or  twice  a  year  the 
class-masters  would  hold  out  Rochambeau  as  a  reward  for 
diligence. 

In  1812,  toward  the  end  of  the  spring,  we  were  to  go  there 
for  the  first  time.  Our  anxiety  to  see  this  famous  Rochambeau 
Castle,  where  the  owner  sometimes  treated  the  boys  to  milk, 
made  us  all  very  good,  and  nothing  hindered  the  outing. 


192  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

Neither  Lambert  nor  I  had  ever  seen  the  pretty  valley  of  the 
Loir  where  the  house  stood.  So  his  imagination  and  mine 
were  much  excited  by  the  prospect  of  this  excursion,  which 
filled  the  school  with  traditional  glee.  We  talked  of  it  all  the 
evening,  planning  to  spend  in  fruit  or  milk  such  money  as  we 
had  saved,  against  all  the  habits  of  school-life. 

After  dinner  next  day,  we  set  out  at  half-past  twelve,  each 
provided  with  a  square  hunch  of  bread,  given  to  us  for  our 
afternoon  lunch.  And  off  we  went,  as  gay  as  swallows, 
marching  in  a  body  on  the  famous  castle  with  an  eagerness 
which  would  at  first  allow  of  no  fatigue.  When  we  reached 
the  hill,  whence  we  looked  down  on  the  house  standing  half- 
way down  the  slope,  on  the  devious  valley  through  which  the 
river  winds  and  sparkles  between  meadows  in  graceful  curves 
— a  beautiful  landscape,  one  of  those  scenes  to  which  the  keen 
emotions  of  early  youth  or  of  love  lend  such  a  charm,  that  it 
is  wise  never  to  see  them  again  in  later  years — Louis  Lambert 
said  to  me:  "  Why,  I  saw  this  last  night  in  a  dream." 

He  recognized  the  clump  of  trees  under  which  we  were 
standing,  the  grouping  of  the  woods,  the  color  of  the  water, 
the  turrets  of  the  castle,  the  details,  the  distance ;  in  fact, 
every  part  of  the  prospect  which  he  looked  on  for  the  first 
time.  We  were  mere  children ;  I,  at  any  rate,  who  was  but 
thirteen  ;  Louis,  at  fifteen,  might  have  the  precocity  of  genius, 
but  at  that  time  we  were  incapable  of  falsehood  in  the  most 
trivial  matters  of  our  life  as  friends.  Indeed,  if  Lambert's 
powerful  mind  had  any  presentiment  of  the  importance  of 
such  facts,  he  was  far  from  appreciating  their  whole  bearing ; 
and  he  was  quite  astonished  by  this  incident.  I  asked  him  if 
he  had  not  perhaps  been  brought  to  Rochambeau  in  his  in- 
fancy, and  my  question  struck  him  ;  but  after  thinking  it 
over,  he  answered  in  the  negative.  This  incident,  analogous 
to  what  may  be  known  of  the  phenomena  of  sleep  in  several 
persons,  will  illustrate  the  beginning  of  Lambert's  line  of 
talent ;  he  took  it,  in  fact,  as  the  basis  of  a  whole  system,  using 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  193 

a  fragment — as  Cuvier  did  in  another  branch  of  inquiry — as 
a  clue  to  the  reconstruction  of  a  complete  system. 

At  this  moment  we  were  sitting  together  on  an  old  oak- 
stump,  and,  after  a  few  minutes'  reflection,  Louis  said  to  me — 

"  If  the  landscape  did  not  come  to  me — which  it  is  absurd 
to  imagine — I  must  have  come  here.  If  I  was  here  while  I 
was  asleep  in  my  chamber,  does  not  that  constitute  a  complete 
severance  of  my  body  and  my  inner  being?  Does  it  not 
prove  some  inscrutable  locomotive  faculty  in  the  spirit  with 
effects  resembling  those  of  locomotion  in  the  body?  Well, 
then,  if  my  spirit  and  my  body  can  be  severed  during  sleep, 
why  should  I  not  insist  on  their  separating  in  the  same  way 
while  I  am  awake?  I  see  no  half-way  mean  between  the  two 
propositions. 

"  But  if  we  go  further  into  details :  Either  the  facts  are  due 
to  the  action  of  a  faculty  which  brings  out  a  second  being  to 
whom  my  body  is  merely  a  husk,  since  I  was  in  my  cell,  and 
yet  I  saw  the  landscape — and  this  upsets  many  systems;  or 
the  facts  took  place  either  in  some  nerve-centre,  of  which  the 
name  is  yet  to  be  discovered,  where  our  feelings  dwell  and 
move ;  or  else  in  the  cerebral  centre,  where  ideas  are  formed. 
This  last  hypothesis  gives  rise  to  some  strange  questions.  I 
walked,  I  saw,  I  heard.  Motion  is  inconceivable  but  in 
space,  sound  acts  only  at  certain  angles  or  on  surfaces,  color 
is  caused  only  by  light.  If,  in  the  dark,  with  my  eyes  shut, 
I  saw,  in  myself,  colored  objects;  if  I  heard  sounds  in  the 
most  perfect  silence  and  without  the  conditions  requisite  for 
the  production  of  sound  ;  if  without  stirring  I  traversed  wide 
tracts  of  space,  there  must  be  inner  faculties  independent  of 
the  external  laws  of  physics.  Material  nature  must  be  pene- 
trable by  the  spirit. 

"  How  is  it  that  men  have  hitherto  given  so  little  thought 

to  the  phenomena  of  sleep,  which  seem  to  prove  that  man 

has  a  double  life  ?     May  there  not  be  a  new  science  lying 

beneath  them  ?  "  he  added,  striking  his  brow  with  his  hand. 

13 


194  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

% 

"  If  not  the  elements  of  a  science,  at  any  rate  the  revelation 
of  stupendous  powers  in  man ;  at  least  they  prove  a  frequent 
severance  of  our  two  natures,  the  fact  I  have  been  thinking 
out  for  a  very  long  time.  At  last,  then,  I  have  hit  on  evi- 
dence to  show  the  superiority  that  distinguishes  our  latent 
senses  from  our  corporeal  senses  !  Homo  duplex  ? 

"And  yet,"  he  went  on,  after  a  pause,  with  a  doubtful 
shrug,  "  perhaps  we  have  not  two  natures ;  perhaps  we  are 
merely  gifted  with  personal  and  perfectible  qualities,  of  which 
the  development  within  us  produces  certain  unobserved  phe- 
nomena of  activity,  penetration,  and  vision.  In  our  love  of 
the  marvelous,  a  passion  begotten  of  our  pride,  we  have  trans- 
lated these  effects  into  poetical  inventions,  because  we  did 
not  understand  them.  It  is  so  convenient  to  deify  the  incom- 
prehensible !  • 

"  I  should,  I  own,  lament  over  the  loss  of  my  illusions.  I 
so  much  wished  to  believe  in  our  twofold  nature  and  in 
Swedenborg's  angels.  Must  this  new  science  destroy  them  ? 
Yes ;  for  the  study  of  our  unknown  properties  involves  us  in 
a  science  that  appears  to  be  materialistic,  for  the  Spirit  uses, 
divides,  and  animates  the  Substance ;  but  it  does  not  destroy 
it." 

He  remained  pensive,  almost  sad.  Perhaps  he  saw  the 
dreams  of  his  youth  as  swaddling  clothes  that  he  must  soon 
shake  off. 

"  Sight  and  hearing  are,  no  doubt,  the  sheaths  for  a  very 
marvelous  instrument,"  said  he,  laughing  at  his  own  figure  of 
speech. 

Always  when  he  was  talking  to  me  of  heaven  and  hell,  he 
was  wont  to  treat  of  nature  as  being  master ;  but  now,  as  he 
pronounced  these  last  words,  big  with  prescience,  he  seemed 
to  soar  more  boldly  than  ever  above  the  landscape,  and  his 
forehead  seemed  ready  to  burst  with  the  afflatus  of  genius. 
His  powers — mental  powers  we  must  call  them  till  some  new 
term  is  found — seemed  to  flash  from  the  organs  intended  to 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  196 

express  them.  His  eyes  shot  out  thoughts;  his  uplifted  hand, 
his  silent  but  tremulous  lips  were  eloquent ;  his  burning  glance 
was  radiant;  at  last  his  head,  as  though  too  heavy,  or  ex- 
hausted by  too  eager  a  flight,  fell  on  his  breast.  This  boy 
— this  giant — bent  his  head,  took  my  hand  and  clasped  it  in 
his  own,  which  was  damp,  so  fevered  was  he  for  the  search 
for  truth  ;  then,  after  a  pause,  he  said — 

"I  shall  be  famous!  And  you  too,"  he  added  after  a 
pause.  "  We  will  both  study  the  chemistry  of  the  Will." 

Noble  soul !  I  recognized  his  superiority,  though  he  took 
great  care  never  to  make  me  feel  it.  He  shared  with  me  all 
the  treasures  of  his  mind,  and  regarded  me  as  instrumental  in 
his  discoveries,  leaving  me  the  credit  of  my  insignificant  con- 
tributions. He  was  always  as  gracious  as  a  woman  in  love ; 
he  had  all  the  bashful  feeling,  the  delicacy  of  soul  which  make 
life  happy  and  pleasant  to  endure. 

On  the  following  day  he  began  writing  what  he  called  a 
"Treatise  on  the  Will;"  his  subsequent  reflections  led  to 
many  changes  in  its  plan  and  method ;  but  the  incident  of 
that  day  was  certainly  the  germ  of  the  work,  just  as  the  electric 
shock  always  felt  by  Mesmer  at  the  approach  of  a  particular 
manservant  was  the  starting-point  of  his  discoveries  in  mag- 
netism, a  science  till  then  interred  under  the  mysteries  of 
Isis,  of  Delphi,  of  the  cave  of  Trophonius,  and  rediscovered 
by  that  prodigious  genius,  close  on  Lavater,*  and  the  precursor 
of  Gall.* 

Lambert's  ideas,  suddenly  illuminated  by  this  flash  of  light, 
assumed  vaster  proportions;  he  disentangled  certain  truths 
from  his  many  acquisitions  and  brought  them  into  order; 
then,  like  a  founder,  he  cast  the  model  of  his  work.  At  the 
end  of  six  months'  indefatigable  labor,  Lambert's  writings  ex- 
cited the  curiosity  of  our  companions,  and  became  the  object 
of  cruel  practical  jokes  which  led  to  a  fatal  issue. 

*  The  respective  founders  of  Physiognomy  and  Phrenology. 


196  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

One  day  one  of  the  masters,  who  was  bent  on  seeing  the 
manuscripts,  enlisted  the  aid  of  our  tyrants,  and  came  to  seize, 
by  force,  a  box  that  contained  the  precious  papers.  Lambert 
and  I  defended  it  with  incredible  courage.  The  trunk  was 
locked,  our  aggressors  could  not  open  it,  but  they  tried  to 
smash  it  in  the  struggle,  a  stroke  of  malignity  at  which  we 
shrieked  with  rage.  Some  of  the  boys,  with  a  sense  of  justice, 
or  struck  perhaps  by  our  heroic  defense,  advised  the  attacking 
party  to  leave  us  in  peace,  crushing  us  with  insulting  con- 
tempt. But  suddenly,  brought  to  the  spot  by  the  noise  of  a 
battle,  Father  Haugoult  roughly  intervened,  inquiring  as  to 
the  cause  of  the  fight.  Our  enemies  had  interrupted  us  in 
writing  our  impositions,  and  the  class-master  came  to  protect 
his  slaves.  The  foe,  in  self-defense,  betrayed  the  existence  of 
the  manuscript.  The  dreadful  Haugoult  insisted  on  our  giv- 
ing up  the  box ;  if  we  should  resist,  he  would  have  it  broken 
open.  Lambert  gave  him  the  key ;  the  master  took  out  the 
papers,  glanced  through  them,  and  said,  as  he  confiscated 
them — 

"And  it  is  for  such  rubbish  as  this  that  you  neglect  your 
lessons !  " 

Large  tears  fell  from  Lambert's  eyes,  wrung  from  him  as 
much  by  a  sense  of  his  offended  moral  superiority  as  by  the 
gratuitous  insult  and  betrayal  that  we  had  suffered.  We  gave 
the  accusers  a  glance  of  stern  reproach:  had  they  not  de- 
livered us  over  to  the  common  enemy?  If  the  common  law 
of  school  entitled  them  to  thrash  us,  did  it  not  require  them 
to  keep  silence  as  to  our  misdeeds  ? 

In  a  moment  they  were,  no  doubt,  ashamed  of  their  base- 
ness. 

Father  Haugoult  probably  sold  the  "  Treatise  on  the  Will  " 
to  a  local  grocer,  unconscious  of  the  scientific  treasure,  of 
which  the  germs  thus  fell  into  unworthy  hands. 

Six  months   later   I  left  the  school,  and  I  do  not  know 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  197 

whether  Lambert  ever  recommenced  his  labors.     Our  parting 
threw  him  into  a  mood  of  the  darkest  melancholy. 

It  was  in  memory  of  the  disaster  that  befell  Louis'  book 
that,  in  the  tale  which  comes  first  in  the  studies,  I  adopted 
the  title  invented  by  Lambert  for  a  work  of  fiction,  and  gave 
the  name  of  a  woman  who  was  dear  to  him  to  a  girl  charac- 
terized by  her  self-devotion ;  but  this  is  not  all  I  have  bor- 
rowed from  him :  his  character  and  occupations  were  of  great 
value  to  me  in  writing  that  book,  and  the  subject  arose  from 
some  reminiscences  of  our  youthful  meditations.  This  present 
volume  is  intended  as  a  modest  monument,  a  broken  column, 
to  commemorate  the  life  of  the  man  who  bequeathed  to  me 
all  he  had  to  leave — his  thoughts. 

In  that  boyish  effort  Lambert  had  enshrined  the  ideas  of  a 
man.  Ten  years  later,  when  I  met  some  learned  men  who 
were  devoting  serious  attention  to  the  phenomena  that  had 
struck  us  and  that  Lambert  had  so  marvelously  analyzed,  I 
understood  the  value  of  his  work,  then  already  forgotten  as 
childish.  I  at  once  spent  several  months  in  recalling  the 
principal  theories  discovered  by  my  poor  school-mate.  Hav- 
ing collected  my  reminiscences,  I  can  boldly  state  that,  by 
1812,  he  had  proved,  divined,  and  set  forth  in  his  Treatise 
several  important  facts  of  which,  as  he  had  declared,  evidence 
was  certain  to  come  sooner  or  later.  His  philosophical  spec- 
ulations ought  undoubtedly  to  gain  him  recognition  as  one  of 
the  great  thinkers  who  have  appeared  at  wide  intervals  among 
men,  to  reveal  to  them  the  bare  skeleton  of  some  science  to 
come,  of  which  the  roots  spread  slowly,  but  which,  in  due 
time,  bring  forth  fair  fruit  in  the  intellectual  sphere.  Thus  a 
humble  artisan,  Bernard  Palissy,  searching  the  soil  to  find 
minerals  for  glazing  pottery,  proclaimed,  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  with  the  infallible  intuition  of  genius,  geological  facts 
which  it  is  now  the  glory  of  Cuvier  and  Buffon  to  have  de 
monstrated. 

1  can,  I  believe,  give  some  idea  of  Lambert's  Treatise  by 


198  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

stating  the  chief  propositions  on  which  it  was  based ;  but,  in 
spite  of  myself,  I  shall  strip  them  of  the  ideas  in  which  they 
were  clothed,  and  which  were  indeed  their  indispensable 
accompaniment.  I  started  on  a  different  path,  and  only 
made  use  of  those  of  his  researches  which  answered  the  pur- 
pose of  my  scheme.  I  know  not,  therefore,  whether  as  his 
disciple  I  can  faithfully  expound  his  views,  having  assimilated 
them  in  the  first  instance  so  as  to  color  them  with  my  own. 

New  ideas  require  new  words,  or  a  new  and  expanded  use 
of  old  words,  extended  and  defined  in  their  meaning.  Thus 
Lambert,  to  set  forth  the  basis  of  his  system,  had  adopted 
certain  common  words  that  answered  to  his  notions.  The 
word  Will  he  used  to  connote  the  medium  in  which  the  mind 
moves,  or  to  use  a  less  abstract  expression,  the  mass  of  power 
by  which  man  can  reproduce,  outside  himself,  the  actions 
constituting  his  external  life.  Volition — a  word  due  to 
Locke — expressed  the  act  by  which  a  man  exerts  his  will. 
The  word  Mind,  or  Thought,  which  he  regarded  as  the 
quintessential  product  of  the  Will,  also  represented  the 
medium  in  which  the  ideas  originate  to  which  thought  gives 
substance.  The  Idea,  a  name  common  to  every  creation  of 
the  brain,  constituted  the  act  by  which  man  uses  his  mind. 
Thus  the  Will  and  the  Mind  were  the  two  generating 
forces;  the  Volition  and  the  Idea  were  the  two  products. 
Volition,  he  thought,  was  the  Idea  evolved  from  the  ab- 
stract state  to  a  concrete  state,  from  its  generative  fluid  to 
a  solid  expression,  so  to  speak,  if  such  words  may  be  taken  to 
formulate  notions  so  difficult  of  definition.  According  to 
him,  the  Mind  and  Ideas  are  the  motion  and  the  outcome  of 
our  inner  organization,  just  as  the  Will  and  Volition  are  of 
our  external  activity. 

He  gave  the  Will  precedence  over  the  Mind. 

"You  must  will  before  you  can  think,"  he  said.  "Many 
beings  live  in  a  condition  of  Willing  without  ever  attaining 
to  the  condition  of  Thinking.  In  the  North,  life  is  long; 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  199 

in  the  South,  it  is  shorter ;  but  in  the  North  we  see  torpor, 
in  the  South  a  constant  excitability  of  the  Will,  up  to  the 
point  where  from  an  excess  of  cold  or  of  heat  the  organs 
are  almost  nullified." 

The  use  of  the  word  "  medium  "  was  suggested  to  him  by 
an  observation  he  had  made  in  his  childhood,  though,  to  be 
sure,  he  had  no  suspicion  then  of  its  importance,  but  its 
singularity  naturally  struck  his  delicately  alert  imagination. 
His  mother,  a  fragile,  nervous  woman,  all  sensitiveness  and 
affection,  was  one  of  those  beings  created  to  represent  woman- 
hood in  all  the  perfection  of  her  attributes,  but  relegated  by 
a  mistaken  fate  to  too  low  a  place  in  the  social  scale.  Wholly 
loving,  and  consequently  wholly  suffering,  she  died  young, 
having  thrown  all  her  energies  into  her  motherly  love.  Lam- 
bert, a  child  of  six,  lying,  but  not  always  sleeping,  in  a  cot  by 
his  mother's  bed,  saw  the  electric  sparks  from  her  hair  when 
she  combed  it.  The  man  of  fifteen  made  scientific  application 
of  this  fact  which  had  amused  the  child,  a  fact  beyond  dis- 
pute, of  which  there  is  ample  evidence  in  many  instances, 
especially  of  women  who  by  a  sad  fatality  are  doomed  to  let 
unappreciated  feelings  evaporate  in  the  air,  or  some  super- 
abundant power  run  to  waste. 

In  support  of  his  definitions,  Lambert  propounded  a 
variety  of  problems  to  be  solved,  challenges  flung  out  to 
science,  though  he  proposed  to  seek  the  solution  for  him- 
self. He  inquired,  for  instance,  whether  the  element  that 
constitutes  electricity  does  not  enter  as  a  base  into  the 
specific  fluid  whence  our  Ideas  and  Volitions  proceed  ? 
Whether  the  hair,  which  loses  its  color,  turns  white,  falls  out, 
or  disappears,  in  proportion  to  the  decay  or  crystallization  of 
our  thoughts,  may  not  be  in  fact  a  capillary  system,  either 
absorbent  or  diffusive,  and  wholly  electrical?  Whether  the 
fluid  phenomena  of  the  Will,  a  matter  generated  within  us, 
and  spontaneously  reacting  under  the  impress  of  conditions  as 
yet  unobserved,  were  at  all  more  extraordinary  than  those  of 


200  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

the  invisible  and  intangible  fluid  produced  by  a  voltaic  pile, 
and  applied  to  the  nervous  system  of  a  dead  man  !  Whether 
the  formation  of  Ideas  and  their  constant  diffusion  was  less 
incomprehensible  than  evaporation  of  the  atoms,  impercep- 
tible indeed,  but  so  violent  in  their  effects,  that  are  given  off 
from  a  grain  of  musk  without  any  loss  of  weight.  Whether, 
granting  that  the  function  of  the  skin  is  purely  protective, 
absorbent,  excretive,  and  tactile,  the  circulation  of  the  blood 
and  all  its  mechanism  would  not  correspond  with  the  trans- 
substantiation  of  our  Will,  as  the  circulation  of  the  nerve-fluid 
corresponds  to  that  of  the  Mind  ?  Finally,  whether  the  more 
or  less  rapid  affluence  of  these  two  real  substances  may  not  be 
the  result  of  a  certain  perfection  or  imperfection  of  organs 
whose  conditions  require  investigation  in  every  manifestation? 

Having  set  forth  these  principles,  he  proposed  to  class  the 
phenomena  of  human  life  in  two  series  of  distinct  results,  de- 
manding, with  the  ardent  insistency  of  conviction,  a  special 
analysis  for  each.  In  fact,  having  observed  in  almost  every 
type  of  created  thing  two  separate  motions,  he  assumed,  nay, 
he  asserted,  their  existence  in  our  human  nature,  and  desig- 
nated this  vital  antithesis  Action  and  Reaction. 

"A  desire,"  he  said,  "is  a  fact  completely  accomplished 
in  our  will  before  it  is  accomplished  externally." 

Hence  the  sum-total  of  our  Volitions  and  our  Ideas  con- 
stitutes Action,  and  the  sum-total  of  our  external  acts  he  called 
Reaction. 

When  I  subsequently  read  the  observations  made  by  Bichat 
on  the  duality  of  our  external  senses,  I  was  really  bewildered 
by  my  recollections,  recognizing  the  startling  coincidences 
between  the  views  of  that  celebrated  physiologist  and  those  of 
Louis  Lambert.  They  both  died  too  young,  and  they  had 
with  equal  steps  arrived  at  the  same  strange  truths.  Nature 
has  in  every  case  been  pleased  to  give  a  twofold  purpose  to 
the  various  apparatus  that  constitute  her  creatures ;  and  the 
twofold  action  of  the  human  organism,  which  is  now  ascer- 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  201 

tained  beyond  dispute,  proves  by  a  mass  of  evidence  in  daily 
life  how  true  were  Lambert's  deductions  as  to  Action  and 
Reaction. 

The  inner  Being,  the  Being  of  Action — the  word  he  used 
to  designate  an  unknown  specialization — the  mysterious  nexus 
of  fibrils  to  which  we  owe  the  inadequately  investigated  powers 
of  thought  and  will — in  short,  the  nameless  entity  which  sees, 
acts,  foresees  the  end,  and  accomplishes  everything  before 
expressing  itself  in  any  physical  phenomenon — must,  in  con- 
formity with  its  nature,  be  free  from  the  physical  conditions 
by  which  the  external  Being  of  Reaction,  the  visible  man,  is 
fettered  in  its  manifestation.  From  this  followed  a  multitude 
of  logical  explanation  as  to  those  results  of  our  twofold  nature 
which  appear  the  strangest,  and  a  rectification  of  various 
systems  in  which  truth  and  falsehood  are  mingled. 

Certain  men,  having  had  a  glimpse  of  some  phenomena,  of 
the  natural  working  of  the  Being  of  Action,  were,  like  Swe- 
denborg,  carried  away  above  this  world  by  their  ardent  soul, 
thirsting  for  poetry,  and  filled  with  the  Divine  Spirit.  Thus, 
in  their  ignorance  of  the  causes  and  their  admiration  of  the 
facts,  they  pleased  their  fancy  by  regarding  that  inner  man  as 
divine,  and  constructing  a  mystical  universe.  Hence  we 
have  angels  !  A  lovely  illusion  which  Lambert  would  never 
abandon,  cherishing  it  even  when  the  sword  of  his  logic  was 
cutting  off  their  dazzling  wings. 

"  Heaven,"  he  would  say,  "  must,  after  all,  be  the  survival 
of  our  perfected  faculties,  and  hell  the  void  into  which  our 
unperfected  faculties  are  cast  away." 

But  how,  then,  in  the  ages  when  the  understanding  had 
preserved  the  religious  and  spiritualist  impressions,  which 
prevailed  from  the  time  of  Christ  till  that  of  Descartes,  be- 
tween faith  and  doubt,  how  could  men  help  accounting  for 
the  mysteries  of  our  nature  otherwise  than  by  divine  inter- 
position ?  Of  whom,  but  of  God  Himself,  could  sages  demand 
an  account  of  an  invisible  creature  so  actively  and  so  reactively 


202  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

sensitive,  gifted  with  faculties  so  extensive,  so  improvable  by 
use,  and  so  powerful  under  certain  occult  influences,  that  they 
could  sometimes  see  it  annihilate,  by  some  phenomenon  of 
sight  or  movement,  space  in  its  two  manifestations — Time 
and  Distance — of  which  the  former  is  the  space  of  the  intel- 
lect, the  latter  is  physical  space?  Sometimes  they  found  it 
reconstructing  the  past,  either  by  the  power  of  retrospective 
vision,  or  by  the  mystery  of  a  palingenesis  not  unlike  the 
power  a  man  might  have  of  detecting  in  the  form,  integu- 
ment, and  embryo  of  a  seed,  the  flowers  of  the  past,  and  the 
numberless  variations  of  their  color,  scent,  and  shape  ;  and 
sometimes,  again,  it  could  be  seen  vaguely  foreseeing  the 
future,  either  by  its  apprehension  of  final  causes  or  by  some 
phenomenon  of  physical  presentiment. 

Other  men,  less  poetically  religious,  cold,  and  argumentative 
— quacks  perhaps,  but  enthusiasts  in  brain  at  least,  if  not  in 
heart — recognizing  some  isolated  examples  of  such  phenomena, 
admitted  their  truth  while  refusing  to  consider  them  as  radia- 
ting from  a  common  centre.  Each  of  these  was,  then,  bent 
on  constructing  a  science  out  of  a  simple  fact.  Hence  arose 
demonology,  judicial  astrology,  the  black  arts,  in  short, 
every  form  of  divination  founded  on  circumstances  that  were 
essentially  transient,  because  they  varied  according  to  men's 
temperament,  and  to  conditions  that  are  still  completely  un- 
known. 

But  from  these  errors  of  the  learned,  and  from  the  ecclesi- 
astical trials  under  which  fell  so  many  martyrs  to  their  own 
powers,  startling  evidence  was  derived  of  the  prodigious  facul- 
ties at  the  command  of  the  Being  of  Action,  which,  according 
to  Lambert,  can  abstract  itself  completely  from  the  Being 
of  Reaction,  bursting  its  envelope,  and  piercing  walls  by  its 
potent  vision  ;  a  phenomenon  known  to  the  Hindoos,  as  mis- 
sionaries tell  us,  by  the  name  of  "Tokeiad  ;  "*  or  again,  by 
another  faculty,  can  grasp  in  the  brain,  in  spite  of  its  closest 
*  Telepathy. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  203 

convolutions,  the  ideas  which  are  formed  or  forming  there, 
and  the  whole  of  past  consciousness. 

"  If  apparitions  are  not  impossible,"  said  Lambert,  "  they 
must  be  due  to  a  faculty  of  discerning  the  ideas  which  repre- 
sent man  in  his  purest  essence,  whose  life,  imperishable  per- 
haps, escapes  our  grosser  senses,  though  they  may  become 
perceptible  to  the  inner  being  when  it  has  reached  a  high 
degree  of  ecstasy,  or  a  great  perfection  of  vision." 

I  know — though  my  remembrance  is  now  vague — that  Lam- 
bert, by  following  the  results  of  Mind  and  Will  step  by  step, 
after  he  had  established  their  laws,  accounted  for  a  multitude 
of  phenomena  which,  till  then,  had  been  regarded  with  reason 
as  incomprehensible.  Thus  wizards,  men  possessed,  those 
gifted  with  second-sight,  and  demoniacs  of  every  degree — the 
victims  of  the  Middle  Ages — became  the  subject  of  explana- 
tions so  natural,  that  their  very  simplicity  often  seemed  to  me 
the  seal  of  their  truth.  The  marvelous  gifts  which  the  church 
of  Rome,  jealous  of  all  mysteries,  punished  with  the  stake, 
were,  in  Louis'  opinion,  the  result  of  certain  affinities  between 
the  constituent  elements  of  matter  and  those  of  mind,  which 
proceed  from  the  same  source.  The  man  holding  a  hazel-rod 
when  he  found  a  spring  of  water  was  guided  by  some  antipathy 
or  sympathy  of  which  he  was  unconscious;  nothing  but  the 
eccentricity  of  these  phenomena  could  have  availed  to  give 
some  of  them  historic  certainty. 

Sympathies  have  rarely  been  proved  ;  they  afford  a  kind  of 
pleasure  which  those  who  are  so  happy  as  to  possess  them 
rarely  speak  of  unless  they  are  abnormally  singular,  and  even 
then  only  in  the  privacy  of  intimate  intercourse,  where  every- 
thing is  buried.  But  the  antipathies  that  arise  from  the 
inversion  of  affinities  have,  very  happily,  been  recorded  when 
developed  in  famous  men.  Thus,  Bayle  had  hysterics  when 
he  heard  water  splashing,  Scaliger  turned  pale  at  the  sight  of 
water-cress,  Erasmus  was  thrown  into  a  fever  by  the  smell  of 
fish.  These  three  antipathies  were  connected  with  water. 


204  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

The  Due  d'Epernon  fainted  at  the  sight  of  a  hare,  Tycho- 
Brahe  at  that  of  a  fox,  Henri  III.  at  the  presence  of  a  cat,  the 
Marechal  d'Albret  at  the  sight  of  a  wild  hog;  these  antipathies 
were  produced  by  animal  emanations,  and  often  took  effect 
at  a  great  distance.  The  Chevalier  de  Guise,  Marie  de' 
Medici,  and  many  other  persons  have  felt  faint  at  seeing  a 
rose  even  in  a  painting.  Lord  Bacon,  whether  he  was  fore- 
warned or  not  of  an  eclipse  of  the  moon,  always  fell  into  a 
syncope  ;  and  his  vitality,  suspended  while  the  phenomenon 
lasted,  was  restored  as  soon  as  it  was  over,  without  his  feeling 
any  further  inconvenience.  These  effects  of  antipathy,  all 
well  authenticated  and  chosen  from  among  many  which  history 
has  happened  to  preserve,  are  enough  to  give  a  clue  to  the 
sympathies  which  remain  unknown. 

This  fragment  of  Lambert's  investigations,  which  I  re- 
member from  among  his  essays,  will  throw  a  light  on  the 
method  on  which  he  worked.  I  need  not  emphasize  the  ob- 
vious connection  between  this  theory  and  the  collateral  sci- 
ences projected  by  Gall  and  Lavater;  they  were  its  natural 
corollary ;  and  every  more  or  less  scientific  brain  will  discern 
the  ramifications  by  which  it  is  inevitably  connected  with  the 
phrenological  observations  of  one  and  the  speculations  on  phys- 
iognomy of  the  other. 

Mesmer's  discovery,  so  important,  though  as  yet  so  little 
appreciated,  was  also  embodied  in  a  single  section  of  this 
treatise,  though  Louis  did  not  know  the  Swiss  doctor's  writ- 
ings— which  are  few  and  brief. 

A  simple  and  logical  inference  from  these  principles  led  him 
to  perceive  that  the  will  might  be  accumulated  by  a  contractile 
effort  of  the  inner  man,  and  then,  by  another  effort,  projected, 
or  even  imparted,  to  material  objects.  Thus,  the  whole  force 
of  a  man  must  have  the  property  of  reacting  on  other  men, 
and  of  infusing  into  them  an  essence  foreign  to  their  own,  if 
they  could  not  protect  themselves  against  such  an  aggression. 
The  evidence  of  this  theorem  of  the  science  of  humanity  is, 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  205 

of  course,  very  multifarious;  but  there  is  nothing  to  establish 
it  beyond  question.  We  have  only  the  notorious  disaster  of 
Marius  and  his  harangue  to  the  Cimbrian  commanded  to  kill 
him,  or  the  august  injunction  of  a  mother  to  the  Lion  of 
Florence,  in  historic  proof  of  instances  of  such  lightning 
flashes  of  mind.  To  Lambert,  then,  Will  and  Thought  were 
living  forces ;  and  he  spoke  of  them  in  such  a  way  as  to  im- 
press his  belief  on  the  hearer.  To  him  these  two  forces  were, 
in  a  way,  visible,  tangible.  Thought  was  slow  or  alert,  heavy 
or  nimble,  light  or  dark;  he  ascribed  to  it  all  the  attributes  of 
an  active  agent,  and  thought  of  it  as  rising,  resting,  waking, 
expanding,  growing  old,  shrinking,  becoming  atrophied,  or 
resuscitating  ;  he  described  its  life,  and  specified  all  its  actions 
by  the  strangest  words  in  our  language,  speaking  of  its  spon- 
taneity, its  strength,  and  all  its  qualities  with  a  kind  of  intui- 
tion which  enabled  him  to  recognize  aj[j  the  manifestations  of 
its  substantial  existence. 

"  Often,"  said  he,  "  in  the  midst  of  quiet  and  silence,  when 
our  inner  faculties  are  dormant,  when  we  have  given  our- 
selves up  to  sweet  repose,  when  a  sort  of  darkness  reigns 
within  us,  and  we  are  lost  in  the  contemplation  of  things  out- 
side us,  an  idea  suddenly  flies  forth,  and  rushes  with  the  swift- 
ness of  lightning  across  the  infinite  space  which  our  inner 
vision  allows  us  to  perceive.  This  radiant  idea,  springing  into 
existence  like  a  will-o'-the-wisp,  dies  out  never  to  return;  an 
ephemeral  life,  that  of  babes  who  give  their  parents  such 
infinite  joy  and  sorrow;  a  sort  of  still-born  blossom  in  the 
fields  of  the  mind.  Sometimes  an  idea,  instead  of  springing 
forcibly  into  life  and  dying  unembodied,  dawns  gradually, 
hovers  in  the  unknown  limbo  of  the  organs  where  it  has  its 
birth  ;  exhausts  us  by  long  gestation,  develops,  is  itself  fruit- 
ful, grows  outwardly  in  all  the  grace  of  youth  and  the  promis- 
ing attributes  of  a  long  life ;  it  can  endure  the  closest  inspec- 
tion, invites  it,  and  never  tires  the  sight ;  the  investigation  it 
undergoes  commands  the  admiration  we  give  to  work  slowly 


206  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

elaborated.  Sometimes  ideas  are  evolved  in  a  swarm ;  one 
brings  another;  they  come  linked  together;  they  vie  with 
each  other;  they  fly  in  clouds,  wild  and  headlong.  Again, 
they  rise  up  pallid  and  misty,  and  perish  for  want  of  strength 
or  of  nutrition ;  the  vital  force  is  lacking.  Or  again,  on 
certain  days,  they  rush  down  into  the  depths  to  light  up  that 
immense  obscurity ;  they  terrify  us  and  leave  the  soul  dejected. 

"Ideas  are  a  complete  system  within  us,  resembling  a 
natural  kingdom,  a  sort  of  flora,  of  which  the  image  will  one 
day  be  outlined  by  some  man  who  will  perhaps  be  accounted 
a  madman. 

"Yes,  within  us  and  without,  everything  testifies  to  the 
livingness  of  those  exquisite  creations,  which  I  compare  with 
flowers  in  obedience  to  some  unutterable  revelation  of  their 
true  nature ! 

"  Their  being  produced  as  the  final  cause  of  man  is,  after 
all,  not  more  amazing  than  the  production  of  perfume  and 
color  in  a  plant.  Perfumes  are  ideas,  perhaps  ! 

"When  we  consider  that  the  line  where  flesh  ends  and  the 
nail  begins  contains  the  invisible  and  inexplicable  mystery  of 
the  constant  transformation  of  a  fluid  into  horn,  we  must  con- 
fess that  nothing  is  impossible  in  the  marvelous  modifications 
of  human  tissue. 

"And  are  there  not  in  our  inner  nature  phenomena  of 
weight  and  motion  comparable  to  those  of  physical  nature? 
Suspense,  to  choose  an  example  vividly  familiar  to  everybody, 
is  painful  only  as  a  result  of  the  law  in  virtue  of  which  the 
weight  of  a  body  is  multiplied  by  its  velocity.  The  weight  of 
the  feeling  produced  by  suspense  increases  by  the  constant 
addition  of  past  pain  to  the  pain  of  the  moment. 

"And  then,  to  what,  unless  it  be  to  the  electric  fluid,  are 
we  to  attribute  the  magic  by  which  the  Will  enthrones  itself 
so  imperiously  in  the  eye  to  demolish  obstacles  at  the  behest 
of  genius,  thunders  in  the  voice,  or  filters,  in  spite  of  dissim- 
ulation, through  the  human  frame  ?  The  current  of  that 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  207 

sovereign  fluid,  which,  in  obedience  to  the  high  pressure  of 
thought  or  of  feeling,  flows  in  a  torrent  or  is  reduced  to  a 
mere  thread,  and  collects  to  flash  in  lightnings,  is  the  occult 
agent  to  which  are  due  the  evil  or  the  beneficent  efforts  Lof 
Art  and  Passion — intonation  of  voice,  whether  harsh  or  suave, 
terrible,  lascivious,  horrifying  or  seductive  by  turns,  thrilling 
the  heart,  the  nerves,  or  the  brain  at  our  will ;  the  marvels  of 
the  touch,  the  instrument  of  the  mental  transfusions  of  a 
myriad  artists,  whose  creative  fingers  are  able,  after  passionate 
study,  to  reproduce  the  forms  of  nature ;  or,  again,  the  infinite 
gradations  of  the  eye  from  dull  inertia  to  the  emission  of  the 
most  terrifying  gleams. 

"  By  this  system  God  is  bereft  of  none  of  His  rights. 
Mind,  as  a  form  of  matter,  has  brought  me  a  new  conviction 
of  His  greatness." 

After  hearing  him  discourse  thus,  after  receiving  into  my 
soul  his  look  like  a  ray  of  light,  it  was  difficult  not  to  be 
dazzled  by  his  conviction  and  carried  away  by  his  arguments. 
The  Mind  appeared  to  me  as  a  purely  physical  power,  sur- 
rounded by  its  innumerable  progeny.  It  was  a  novel  concep- 
tion of  humanity  under  a  new  form. 

This  brief  sketch  of  the  laws  which,  as  Lambert  maintained, 
constitute  the  formula  of  our  intellects,  must  suffice  to  give  a 
notion  of  the  prodigious  activity  of  his  spirit  feeding  on  itself. 
Louis  had  sought  for  proofs  of  his  theories  in  the  history  of 
great  men,  whose  lives,  as  set  forth  by  their  biographers, 
supply  very  curious  particulars  as  to  the  operation  of  their 
understanding.  His  memory  allowed  him  to  recall  such  facts 
as  might  serve  to  support  his  statements;  he  had  appended 
them  to  each  chapter  in  the  form  of  demonstrations,  so  as  to 
give  to  many  of  his  theories  an  almost  mathematical  certainty. 
The  works  of  Cardan,  a  man  gifted  with  singular  powers  of 
insight,  supplied  him  with  valuable  materials.  He  had  not 
forgotten  that  Apollonius  of  Tyana  had,  in  Asia,  announced 
the  death  of  the  tyrant  with  every  detail  of  his  execution,  at 


208  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

the  very  hour  when  it  was  taking  place  in  Rome ;  nor  that 
Plotinus,  when  far  away  from  Porphyrius,  was  aware  of  his 
friend's  intention  to  kill  himself,  and  flew  to  dissuade  him; 
nor  the  incident  in  the  last  century,  proved  in  the  face  of  the 
most  incredulous  mockery  ever  known — an  incident  most 
surprising  to  men  who  were  accustomed  to  regard  doubt  as  a 
weapon  against  the  fact  alone,  but  simple  enough  to  believers 
— the  fact  that  Alphonzo-Maria  di  Liguori,  Bishop  of  Saint- 
Agatha,  administered  consolations  to  Pope  Ganganelli,  who 
saw  him,  heard  him,  and  answered  him,  while  the  bishop 
himself,  at  a  great  distance  from  Rome,  was  in  a  trance  at 
home,  in  the  chair  where  he  commonly  sat  on  his  return  from 
mass.  On  recovering  consciousness,  he  saw  all  his  attendants 
kneeling  beside  him,  believing  him  to  be  dead  :  "  My  friends," 
said  he,  "the  holy  father  is  just  dead."  Two  days  later  a 
letter  confirmed  the  news.  The  hour  of  the  pope's  death 
coincided  with  that  when  the  bishop  had  been  restored  to  his 
natural  state. 

Nor  had  Lambert  omitted  the  yet  more  recent  adventure 
of  an  English  girl  who  was  passionately  attached  to  a  sailor, 
and  set  out  from  London  to  seek  him.  She  found  him,  with- 
out a  guide,  making  her  way  alone  in  the  North  American 
wilderness,  reaching  him  just  in  time  to  save  his  life. 

Louis  had  found  confirmatory  evidence  in  the  mysteries  of 
the  ancients,  in  the  acts  of  the  martyrs — in  which  glorious  in- 
stances may  be  found  of  the  triumph  of  human  will,  in  the 
demonology  of  the  Middle  Ages,  in  criminal  trials  and  med- 
ical researches;  always  select-ing  the  real  fact,  the  probable 
phenomenon,  with  admirable  sagacity. 

All  this  rich  collection  of  scientific  anecdotes,  culled  from 
so  many  books,  most  of  them  worthy  ot  credit,  served  no 
doubt  to  wrap  parcels  in  ;  and  this  work,  which  was  curious, 
to  say  the  least  of  it,  as  the  outcome  of  a  most  extraordinary 
memory,  was  doomed  to  destruction. 

Among  the  various  cases  which  added  to  the  value  of  Lam- 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  209 

bert's  Treatise  was  an  incident  that  had  taken  place  in  his 
own  family,  of  which  he  had  told  me  before  he  wrote  his 
essay.  This  fact,  bearing  on  the  post-existence  of  the  inner 
man,  if  I  may  be  allowed  to  coin  a  new  word  for  a  phenom- 
enon hitherto  nameless,  struck  me  so  forcibly  that  I  have 
never  forgotten  it.  His  father  and  mother  were  being  forced 
into  a  lawsuit,  of  which  the  loss  would  leave  them  with  a  stain 
on  their  good  name,  the  only  thing  they  had  in  the  world. 
Hence  their  anxiety  was  very  great  when  the  question  first 
arose  as  to  whether  they  should  yield  to  the  plaintiffs  unjust 
demands,  or  should  defend  themselves  against  him.  The 
matter  came  under  discussion  one  autumn  evening,  before  a 
turf  fire  in  the  room  used  by  the  tanner  and  his  wife.  Two 
or  three  relations  were  invited  to  this  family  council,  and 
among  others  Louis'  maternal  great-grandfather,  an  old  la- 
borer, much  bent,  but  with  a  venerable  and  dignified  counte- 
nance, bright  eyes,  and  a  nearly  bald,  yellow  head,  on  which 
grew  a  few  locks  of  thin,  white  hair.  Like  the  Obi  of  the 
Negroes  or  the  Sagamore*  of  the  Indian  savage,  he  was  a  sort 
of  oracle,  consulted  on  important  occasions.  His  land  was 
tilled  by  his  grandchildren,  who  fed  and  served  him;  he 
predicted  rain  and  fine  weather,  and  told  them  when  to  mow 
the  hay  and  gather  the  crops.  The  barometric  exactitude  of 
nis  forecasts  was  quite  famous,  and  added  to  the  confidence 
and  respect  he  inspired.  For  whole  days  he  would  sit  immov- 
able in  his  armchair.  This  state  of  rapt  meditation  often 
came  upon  him  since  his  wife's  death ;  he  had  been  attached 
to  her  with  the  truest  and  most  faithful  affection. 

This  discussion  was  held  in  his  presence,  but  he  did  not 
seem  to  give  much  heed  to  it. 

"  My  children,"  said  he,  when  he  was  asked  for  his  opinion, 
"  this  is  too  serious  a  matter  for  me  to  decide  on  alone.  I 
must  go  and  consult  my  wife." 

The  old  man  rose,  took  his  stick,  and  went  out,  to  the  great 

*  Medicine  Man. 
14 


210  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

astonishment  of  the  others,  who  thought  him  crazy.  He  pres- 
ently came  back  and  said — 

"  I  did  not  have  to  go  so  far  as  the  graveyard ;  your  mother 
came  to  meet  me ;  I  found  her  by  the  brook.  She  tells  me 
that  you  will  find  some  receipts  in  the  hands  of  a  notary  at 
Blois,  which  will  enable  you  to  gain  your  suit." 

The  words  were  spoken  in  a  firm  tone ;  the  old  man's  de- 
meanor and  countenance  showed  that  such  an  apparition  was 
habitual  with  him.  In  fact,  the  disputed  receipts  were  found, 
and  the  lawsuit  was  not  attempted. 

This  event,  under  his  father's  roof  and  of  his  own  knowl- 
edge, when  Louis  was  nine  years  old,  contributed  largely  to 
his  belief  in  Swedenborg's  miraculous  visions,  for  in  the  course 
of  that  philosopher's  life  he  repeatedly  gave  proofs  of  the 
power  of  sight  developed  in  his  Inner  Being.  As  he  grew 
older,  and  as  his  intelligence  was  developed,  Lambert  was  nat- 
urally led  to  seek  in  the  laws  of  nature  for  the  causes  of  the 
miracle  which,  in  his  childhood,  had  captivated  his  attention. 
What  name  can  be  given  to  the  chance  which  brought  within 
his  ken  so  many  facts  and  books  bearing  on  such  phenomena, 
and  made  him  the  principal  subject  and  actor  in  such  marvel- 
ous manifestations  of  mind? 

If  Lambert  had  no  other  title  to  fame  than  the  fact  of  his 
having  formulated,  in  his  sixteenth  year,  such  a  psychological 
dictum  as  this:  "  The  events  which  bear  witness  to  the  action 
of  the  human  race,  and  are  the  outcome  of  its  intellect,  have 
causes  by  which  they  are  preconceived,  as  our  actions  are  ac- 
complished in  our  mind  before  they  are  reproduced  by  the 
outer  man ;  presentiments  or  predictions  are  the  perception 
of  these  causes" — I  think  we  may  deplore  in  him  a  genius 
equal  to  Pascal,  Lavoisier,  or  Laplace.  His  chimerical  no- 
tions about  angels  perhaps  overruled  his  work  too  long ;  but 
was  it  not  in  trying  to  make  gold  that  the  alchemists  uncon- 
sciously created  chemistry?  At  the  same  time,  Lambert,  at  a 
later  period,  studied  comparative  anatomy,  physics,  geometry, 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  211 

and  other  sciences  bearing  on  his  discoveries,  and  this  was 
undoubtedly  with  the  purpose  of  collecting  facts  and  submit- 
ting them  to  analysis — the  only  torch  that  can  guide  us 
through  the  dark  places  of  the  most  inscrutable  work  of 
nature.  He  had  too  much  good  sense  to  dwell  among  the 
clouds  of  theories  which  can  all  be  expressed  in  a  few  words. 
In  our  day,  is  not  the  simplest  demonstration  based  on  facts 
more  highly  esteemed  than  the  most  specious  system  though 
defended  by  more  or  less  ingenious  inductions?  But  as  I  did 
not  know  him  at  the  period  of  his  life  when  his  cogitations 
were,  no  doubt,  the  most  productive  of  results,  I  can  only 
conjecture  what  the  bent  of  his  work  must  have  been  from 
that  of  his  first  efforts  of  thought. 

It  is  easy  to  see  where  his  "Treatise  on  the  Will"  was 
faulty.  Though  gifted  already  with  the  powers  which  charac- 
terize superior  men,  he  was  but  a  boy.  His  brain,  though 
endowed  with  a  great  faculty  for  abstractions,  was  still  full  of 
the  delightful  beliefs  that  hover  around  youth.  Thus  his 
conception,  while  at  some  points  it  touched  the  ripest  fruits 
of  his  genius,  still,  by  many  more,  clung  to  the  smaller  ele- 
ments of  its  germs.  To  certain  readers,  lovers  of  poetry, 
what  he  chiefly  lacked  must  have  been  a  certain  vein  of 
interest. 

But  his  work  bore  the  stamp  of  the  struggle  that  was  going 
on  in  that  noble  Spirit  between  the  two  great  principles  of 
Spiritualism  and  Materialism,  round  which  so  many  a  fine 
genius  has  beaten  its  way  without  ever  daring  to  amalgamate 
them.  Louis,  at  first  purely  Spiritualist,  had  been  irresistibly 
led  to  recognize  the  Material  conditions  of  Mind.  Con- 
founded by  the  facts  of  analysis  at  the  moment  when  his 
heart  still  gazed  with  yearning  at  the  clouds  that  floated  in 
Swedenborg's  heaven,  he  had  not  yet  acquired  the  necessary 
powers  to  produce  a  coherent  system,  compactly  cast  in  a 
piece,  as  it  were.  Hence  certain  inconsistencies  that  have 
left  their  stamp  even  on  the  sketch  here  given  of  his  first 


212  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

attempts.  Still,  incomplete  as  his  work  may  have  been,  was 
it  not  the  rough  copy  of  a  science  of  which  he  would  have 
investigated  the  secrets  at  a  later  time,  have  secured  the 
foundations,  have  examined,  deduced,  and  connected  the 
logical  sequence? 

Six  months  after  the  confiscation  of  the  "Treatise  on  the 
Will"  I  left  school.  Our  parting  was  unexpected.  My 
mother,  alarmed  by  a  feverish  attack  which  for  some  months 
I  had  been  unable  to  shake  off,  while  my  inactive  life  induced 
symptoms  of  coma,  carried  me  off  at  four  or  five  hours'  notice. 
The  announcement  of  my  departure  reduced  Lambert  to 
dreadful  dejection. 

"Shall  I  ever  see  you  again?"  said  he  in  his  gentle  voice, 
as  he  clasped  me  in  his  arms.  "  You  will  live,"  he  went  on, 
"  but  I  shall  die.  If  I  can,  I  will  come  back  to  you." 

Only  the  young  can  utter  such  words  with  the  accent  of 
conviction  that  gives  them  the  impressiveness  of  prophecy, 
of  a  pledge,  leaving  a  terror  of  its  fulfillment.  For  a  long 
time  indeed  I  vaguely  looked  for  the  promised  apparition. 
Even  now  there  are  days  of  depression,  of  doubt,  alarm,  and 
loneliness,  when  I  am  forced  to  repel  the  intrusion  of  that  sad 
parting,  though  it  was  not  fated  to  be  the  last. 

When  I  crossed  the  yard  by  which  we  left,  Lambert  was  at 
one  of  the  refectory  windows  to  see  me  pass.  By  my  request 
my  mother  obtained  leave  for  him  to  dine  with  us  at  the  inn, 
and  in  the  evening  I  escorted  him  back  to  the  fatal  gate  of  the 
college.  No  lover  and  his  mistress  ever  shed  more  tears  at 
parting. 

"  Well,  good-by ;  I  shall  be  left  alone  in  this  desert !  "  said 
he,  pointing  to  the  play-ground  where  two  hundred  boys  were 
disporting  themselves  and  shouting.  "  When  I  come  back 
half-dead  with  fatigue  from  my  long  excursions  through  the 
fields  of  thought,  on  whose  heart  can  I  rest  ?  I  could  tell  you 
everything  in  a  look.  Who  will  understand  me  now  ?  Good- 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  213 

by  !  I  could  wish  I  had  never  met  you ;  I  should  not  know 
all  I  am  losing." 

"And  what  is  to  become  of  me  ?"  said  I.  "Is  not  my 
position  a  dreadful  one  ?  /  have  nothing  here  to  uphold  me ! " 
and  I  slapped  my  forehead. 

He  shook  his  head  with  a  gentle  gesture,  gracious  and  sad, 
and  we  parted. 

At  that  time  Louis  Lambert  was  about  five  feet  five  inches 
in  height;  he  grew  no  more.  His  countenance,  which  was 
full  of  expression,  revealed  his  sweet  nature.  Divine  patience, 
developed  by  harsh  usage,  and  the  constant  concentration 
needed  for  his  meditative  life,  had  bereft  his  eyes  of  the  auda- 
cious pride  which  is  so  attractive  in  some  faces,  and  which  had  so 
shocked  our  masters.  Peaceful  mildness  gave  charm  to  his 
face,  an  exquisite  serenity  that  was  never  marred  by  a  tinge 
of  irony  or  satire ;  for  his  natural  kindliness  tempered  his 
conscious  strength  and  superiority.  He  had  pretty  hands, 
very  slender,  and  almost  always  moist.  His  frame  was  a  marvel, 
a  model  for  a  sculptor;  but  our  iron-gray  uniform,  with  gilt 
buttons  and  knee-breeches,  gave  us  such  an  ungainly  appear- 
ance that  Lambert's  fine  proportions  and  firm  muscles  could 
only  be  appreciated  in  the  bath.  When  we  swam  in  our  pool 
in  the  Loir,  Louis  was  conspicuous  by  the  whiteness  of  his 
skin,  which  was  unlike  the  different  shades  of  our  school- 
fellows' bodies  mottled  by  the  cold,  or  blue  from  the  water. 
Gracefully  formed,  elegant  in  his  attitudes,  delicate  in  hue, 
never  shivering  after  his  bath,  perhaps  because  he  avoided 
the  shade  and  always  ran  into  the  sunshine,  Louis  was  like  one 
of  those  cautious  blossoms  that  close  their  petals  to  the  blast 
and  refuse  to  open  unless  to  a  clear  sky.  He  ate  little,  and 
drank  water  only;  either  by  instinct  or  by  choice  he  was 
averse  to  any  exertion  that  made  a  demand  on  his  strength  ; 
his  movements  were  few  and  simple,  like  those  of  Orientals 
or  of  savages,  with  whom  gravity  seems  a  condition  of  nature. 

As  a  rule,  he  disliked  everything  that  resembled  any  special 


214  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

care  for  his  person.  He  commonly  sat  with  his  head  a  little 
inclined  to  the  left,  and  so  constantly  rested  his  elbows  on  the 
table  that  the  sleeves  of  his  coats  were  soon  in  holes. 

To  this  slight  picture  of  the  outer  man  I  must  add  a  sketch 
of  his  moral  qualities,  for  I  believe  I  can  now  judge  him  im- 
partially. 

Though  naturally  religious.  Louis  did  not  accept  the  minute 
practices  of  the  Romish  ritual ;  his  ideas  were  more  intimately 
in  sympathy  with  Saint-Theresa  and  Fenelon,  and  several 
fathers  and  certain  saints,  who,  in  our  day,  would  be  regarded 
as  heresiarchs  or  atheists.  He  was  rigidly  calm  during  the 
services.  His  own  prayers  went  up  in  gusts,  in  aspirations, 
without  any  regular  formality  •  in  all  things  he  gave  himself 
up  to  nature,  and  would  not  pray,  any  more  than  he  would 
think,  at  any  fixed  hour.  In  chapel  he  was  equally  apt  to 
think  of  God  or  to  meditate  on  some  problem  of  natural 
philosophy. 

To  him  Jesus  Christ  was  the  most  perfect  type  of  his  system. 
El  Verbum  caro  factum  est  seemed  a  sublime  statement  in- 
tended to  express  the  traditional  formula  of  the  Will,  the  Word, 
and  the  Act  made  visible.  Christ's  unconsciousness  of  His 
death — having  so  perfected  His  Inner  Being  by  divine  works, 
that  one  day  the  invisible  form  of  it  appeared  to  His  disciples 
— and  the  other  mysteries  of  the  Gospels,  the  magnetic  cures 
wrought  by  Christ,  and  the  gift  of  tongues,  all  to  him  con- 
firmed his  doctrine.  I  remember  once  hearing  him  say  on 
this  subject  that  the  greatest  work  that  could  be  written  nowa- 
days was  a  history  of  the  primitive  church.  And  he  never 
rose  to  such  poetic  heights  as  when,  in  the  evening,  as  we  con- 
versed, he  would  enter  on  an  inquiry  into  miracles  worked  by 
the  power  of  Will  during  that  great  age  of  faith.  He  discerned 
the  strongest  evidence  of  his  theory  in  most  of  the  martyr- 
doms endured  during  the  first  century  of  our  era,  which  he 
spoke  of  as  "  the  great  era  of  the  Mind." 

"  Do  not  the  phenomena  observed  in  almost  every  instance 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  21o 

of  the  torments  so  heroically  endured  by  the  early  Christians 
for  the  establishment  of  the  faith  amply  prove  that  Material 
force  will  never  prevail  against  the  force  of  Ideas  or  the  Will 
of  man  ?  "  he  would  say.  "  From  this  effect,  produced  by  the 
Will  of  all,  each  man  may  draw  conclusions  in  favor  of  his 
own." 

I  need  say  nothing  of  his  views  on  poetry  or  history,  nor  of 
his  judgment  on  the  masterpieces  of  our  language.  There 
would  be  little  interest  in  the  record  of  opinions  now  almost 
universally  held,  though  at  that  time,  from  the  lips  of  a  boy, 
they  might  seem  remarkable.  Louis  was  capable  of  the  highest 
flights.  To  give  a  notion  of  his  talents  in  two  words,  he  could 
have  written  "  Zadig"  as  wittily  as  Voltaire  ;  he  could  have 
thought  out  the  Dialogue  between  Syllaand  Eucrates  as  power- 
fully as  Montesquieu.  His  rectitude  of  character  made  him 
desire  above  all  else  in  a  work  that  it  should  bear  the  stamp  of 
utility ;  at  the  same  time  his  refined  taste  demanded  novelty 
of  thought  as  well  as  of  form.  One  of  his  most  remarkable 
literary  observations,  which  will  serve  as  a  clue  to  all  the. 
others,  and  show  the  lucidity  of  his  judgment,  is  this,  which 
has  ever  dwelt  in  my  memory:  "The  Apocalypse  is  written 
ecstasy."  He  regarded  the  Bible  as  a  part  of  the  traditional 
history  of  the  antediluvian  nations  which  had  taken  for  its 
share  the  new  humanity.  He  thought  that  the  mythology  of 
the  Greeks  was  borrowed  both  from  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  and 
from  the  sacred  books  of  India,  adapted  after  their  own  fashion 
by  the  beauty-loving  Hellenes. 

"  It  is  impossible,"  said  he,  "  to  doubt  the  priority  of  the 
Asiatic  scriptures ;  they  are  earlier  than  our  sacred  books. 
The  man  who  is  candid  enough  to  admit  this  historical  fact 
sees  the  whole  world  expand  before  him.  Was  it  not  on  the 
Asiatic  highland  that  the  few  men  took  refuge  who  were  able 
to  escape  the  catastrophe  that  ruined  our  globe — if,  indeed, 
men  had  existed  before  that  cataclysm  or  shock  ?  A  serious 
query,  the  answer  to  which  lies  at  the  bottom  of  the  sea. 


5216  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

The  anthropogony  of  the  Bible  is  merely  a  genealogy  of  a 
swarm  escaping  from  the  human  hive  which  settled  on  the 
mountainous  slopes  of  Thibet  between  the  summits  of  the 
Himalayas  and  the  Caucasus. 

"  The  character  of  the  primitive  ideas  of  that  horde,  called 
by  its  lawgiver  the  people  of  God,  no  doubt  to  secure  its 
unity,  and  perhaps  also  to  induce  it  to  maintain  his  laws  and 
his  system  of  government — for  the  Books  of  Moses  are  a  re- 
ligious, political,  and  civil  code — that  character  bears  the 
authority  of  terror;  convulsions  of  nature  are  interpreted  with 
stupendous  power  as  a  vengeance  from  on  high.  In  fact,  since 
this  wandering  tribe  knew  none  of  the  ease  enjoyed  by  a 
community  settled  in  a  patriarchal  home,  their  sorrows  as 
pilgrims  inspired  them  with  none  but  gloomy  poems,  majestic 
but  blood-stained.  In  the  Hindoos,  on  the  contrary,  the 
spectacle  of  the  rapid  recoveries  of  the  natural  world,  and 
the  prodigious  effects  of  sunshine,  which  they  were  the  first  to 
recognize,  gave  rise  to  happy  images  of  blissful  love,  to  the 
worship  of  Fire  and  of  the  endless  personifications  of  reproduc- 
tive force.  These  fine  fancies  are  lacking  in  the  book  of  the 
Hebrews.  A  constant  need  of  self-preservation  amid  all  the 
dangers  and  the  lands  they  traversed  to  reach  the  promised 
land  engendered  their  exclusive  race-feeling  and  their  hatred 
of  all  other  nations. 

"  These  three  scriptures  are  the  archives  of  an  engulfed  world. 
Therein  lies  the  secret  of  the  extraordinary  splendor  of  those 
languages  and  their  myths.  A  grand  human  history  lies  be- 
neath those  names  of  men  and  places,  and  those  fables  which 
charm  us  so  irresistibly,  we  know  not  why.  Perhaps  it  is 
because  we  find  in  them  the  native  air  of  renewed  humanity." 

Thus,  to  him,  this  threefold  literature  included  all  the 
thoughts  of  man.  Not  a  book  could  be  written,  in  his  opin- 
ion, of  which  the  subject  might  not  there  be  discerned  in  its 
germ.  This  view  shows  how  learnedly  he  had  pursued  his 
early  studies  of  the  Bible,  and  how  far  they  had  led  him. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  217 

Hovering,  as  it  were,  over  the  heads  of  society,  and  knowing 
it  solely  from  books,  he  could  judge  it  coldly. 

"The  law,"  said  he,  "never  puts  a  check  on  the  enter- 
prises of  the  rich  and  great,  but  crushes  the  poor,  who,  on 
the  contrary,  need  protection." 

His  kind  heart  did  not  therefore  allow  him  to  sympathize 
in  political  ideas ;  his  system  led  rather  to  the  passive  obedi- 
ence of  which  Jesus  set  the  example.  During  the  last  hours 
of  my  life  at  Vendome,  Louis  had  ceased  to  feel  the  spur  to 
glory;  he  had,  in  a  way,  had  an  abstract  enjoyment  of  fame; 
and  having  opened  it,  as  the  ancient  priests  of  sacrifice  sought 
to  read  the  future  in  the  hearts  of  men,  he  had  found  nothing 
in  the  entrails  of  his  chimera.  Scorning  a  sentiment  so  wholly 
personal :  "  Glory,"  said  he,  "  is  but  beatified  egoism." 

Here,  perhaps,  before  taking  leave  of  this  exceptional  boy- 
hood, I  may  pronounce  judgment  on  it  by  a  rapid  glance. 

A  short  time  before  our  separation,  at  Vendome,  Lambert 
said  to  me : 

"  Apart  from  the  general  laws  which  I  have  formulated — 
and  this,  perhaps,  will  be  my  glory — laws  which  must  be  those 
of  the  human  organism,  the  life  of  man  is  Movement  deter- 
mined in  each  individual  by  the  pressure  of  some  inscrutable 
influence — by  the  brain,  the  heart,  or  the  sinews.  All  the 
innumerable  modes  of  human  existence  result  from  the  pro- 
portions in  which  these  three  generating  forces  are  more  or 
less  intimately  combined  with  the  substances  they  assimilate  in 
the  environment  in  which  they  live." 

He  stopped  short,  struck  his  forehead,  and  exclaimed  : 
"How  strange!  In  every  great  man  whose  portrait  I  have 
remarked,  the  neck  is  short.  Perhaps  nature  requires  that  in 
them  the  heart  should  be  nearer  to  the  brain  1  " 

Then  he  went  on  : 

"From  that,  a  sum-total  of  action  takes  its  rise  which  con- 
stitutes social  life.  The  man  of  sinew  contributes  action  or 
strength;  the  man  of  brain,  genius;  the  man  of  heart,  faith. 


218  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

But,"  he  added  sadly,  "faith  sees  only  the  clouds  of  the 
sanctuary;  the  Angel  alone  ha?  light." 

So»  according  to  his  own  definitions,  Lambert  was  all  brain 
and  all  heart.  It  seems  to  me  that  his  intellectual  life  was 
divided  into  three  marked  phases. 

Under  the  impulsion,  from  his  earliest  years,  of  a  preco- 
cious activity,  due,  no  doubt,  to  some  malady — or  to  some 
special  perfection — of  organism,  his  powers  were  concentrated 
on  the  functions  of  the  inner  senses  and  a  superabundant  flow 
of  nerve-fluid.  As  a  man  of  ideas,  he  craved  to  satisfy  the 
thirst  of  his  brain,  to  assimilate  every  idea.  Hence  his 
reading ;  and  from  his  reading,  the  reflections  that  gave  him 
the  power  of  reducing  things  to  their  simplest  expression,  and 
of  absorbing  them  to  study  them  in  their  essence.  Thus,  the 
advantages  of  this  splendid  stage,  acquired  by  other  men 
only  after  long  study,  were  achieved  by  Lambert  during  his 
bodily  childhood  :  a  happy  childhood,  colored  by  the  studious 
joys  of  a  born  poet. 

The  point  which  most  thinkers  reach  at  las*  was  to  him  the 
starting-point,  whence  his  brain  was  to  set  out  one  day  in 
search  of  new  worlds  of  knowledge.  Though  as  yet  he  knew 
it  not,  he  had  made  for  himself  the  most  exacting  life  possible, 
and  the  most  insatiably  greedy.  Merely  to  live,  was  he  not 
compelled  to  be  perpetually  casting  nutriment  into  the  gulf  he 
had  opened  in  himself?  Like  some  beings  who  dwell  in  the 
grosser  world,  might  he  not  die  of  inanition  for  want  of  feed- 
ing abnormal  and  disappointed  cravings  ?  Was  not  this 
a  sort  of  debauchery  of  the  intellect  which  might  lead  to 
spontaneous  combustion,  like  that  of  bodies  saturated  with 
alcohol  ? 

I  had  seen  nothing  of  this  first  phase  of  his  brain-develop- 
ment ;  it  is  only  now,  at  a  later  day,  that  I  can  thus  give  an 
account  of  its  prodigious  fruit  and  results.  Lambert  was  then 
thirteen. 

I  was  so  fortunate  as  to  witness  the  first  stage  of  the  second 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  219 

peroid.  Lambert  was  cast  into  all  the  miseries  of  school-life 
— and  that,  perhaps,  was  his  salvation — it  absorbed  the  super- 
abundance of  his  thoughts.  After  passing  from  concrete  ideas 
to  their  purest  expression,  from  words  to  their  ideal  import, 
and  from  that  import  to  principles,  after  reducing  everything 
to  the  abstract,  to  enable  him  to  live  he  yearned  for  yet  other 
intellectual  creations.  Quelled  by  the  woes  of  school  and  the 
critical  development  of  his  physical  constitution,  he  became 
thoughtful,  dreamed  of  feeling,  and  caught  a  glimpse  of  new 
sciences — positively  masses  of  ideas.  Checked  in  his  career, 
and  not  yet  strong  enough  to  contemplate  the  higher  spheres, 
he  contemplated  his  inmost  self.  I  then  perceived  in  him  the 
struggle  of  the  Mind  reacting  on  itself,  and  trying  to  detect 
the  secrets  of  its  own  nature,  like  a  physician  who  watches 
the  course  of  his  own  disease. 

At  this  stage  of  weakness  and  strength,  of  childish  grace 
and  superhuman  powers,  Louis  Lambert  is  the  creature  who, 
more  than  any  other,  gave  me  a  poetical  and  truthful  image 
of  the  being  we  call  an  angel,  always  excepting  one  woman 
whose  name,  whose  features,  whose  identity,  and  whose  life  I 
would  fain  hide  from  all  the  world,  so  as  to  be  sole  master  of 
the  secret  of  her  existence,  and  to  bury  it  in  the  depths  of  my 
heart. 

The  third  phase  I  was  not  destined  to  see.  It  began  when 
Lambert  and  I  were  parted,  for  he  did  not  leave  college  till 
he  was  eighteen,  in  the  summer  of  1815.  He  had  at  that  time 
lost  his  father  and  mother  about  six  months  before.  Finding 
no  member  of  his  family  with  whom  his  soul  could  sympathize, 
expansive  still,  but,  since  our  parting,  thrown  back  on  himself, 
he  made  his  home  with  his  uncle,  who  was  also  his  guardian, 
and  who,  having  been  turned  out  of  his  benefice  as  a  priest 
who  had  taken  the  oaths,  had  come  to  settle  at  Blois.  There 
Louis  lived  for  some  time ;  but  consumed  ere  long  by  the  de- 
sire to  finish  his  incomplete  studies,  he  came  to  Paris  to  see 


220  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

Madame  de  Stael,  and  to  drink  of  science  at  its  highest  source. 
The  old  priest,  being  very  fond  of  his  nephew,  left  Louis  free 
to  spend  his  whole  little  inheritance  in  his  three  years'  stay  in 
Paris,  though  he  lived  very  poorly.  This  fortune  consisted  of 
but  a  few  thousand  francs. 

Lambert  returned  to  Blois  at  the  beginning  of  1820,  driven 
from  Paris  by  the  sufferings  to  which  the  impecunious  are  ex- 
posed there.  He  must  often  have  been  a  victim  to  the  secret 
storms,  the  terrible  rage  of  mind  by  which  artists  are  tossed, 
to  judge  from  the  only  fact  his  uncle  recollected,  and  the  only 
letter  he  preserved  of  all  those  which  Louis  Lambert  wrote  to 
him  at  that  time,  perhaps  because  it  was  the  last  and  the 
longest. 

To  begin  with  the  story.  Louis  one  evening  was  at  the 
Theatre-Francois,  seated  on  a  bench  in  the  upper  gallery,  near 
to  one  of  the  pillars  which,  in  those  days,  divided  off  the  third 
row  of  boxes.  On  rising  between  the  acts,  he  saw  a  young 
woman  who  had  just  come  into  the  box  next  him.  The  sight 
of  this  lady,  who  was  young,  pretty,  well  dressed,  in  a  low 
bodice  no  doubt,  and  escorted  by  a  man  for  whom  her  face 
beamed  with  all  the  charms  of  love,  produced  such  a  terrible 
effect  on  Lambert's  soul  and  senses,  that  he  was  obliged  to 
leave  the  theatre.  If  he  had  not  been  controlled  by  some  re- 
maining glimmer  of  reason,  which  was  not  wholly  extinguished 
by  this  first  fever  of  burning  passion,  he  might  perhaps  have 
yielded  to  the  almost  irresistible  desire  that  came  over  him  to 
kill  the  young  man  on  whom  the  lady's  looks  beamed.  Was 
not  this  a  reversion,  in  the  heart  of  the  Paris  world,  to  the 
savage  passion  that  regards  woman  as  its  prey,  an  effect  of 
animal  instinct  combining  with  the  almost  luminous  flashes  of 
a  soul  crushed  under  the  weight  of  thought  ?  In  short,  was  it 
not  the  prick  of  the  penknife  so  vividly  imagined  by  the  boy, 
felt  by  the  man  as  the  thunderbolt  of  his  most  vital  craving — 
for  love  ? 

And  now,  here  is  the  letter  that  depicts  the  state  of  his  mind 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  221 

as  it  was  struck  by  the  spectacle  of  Parisian  civilization.  His 
feelings,  perpetually  wounded  nc  doubt  in  that  whirlpool  of 
self-interest,  must  always  have  suffered  there;  he  probably  had 
no  friend  to  comfort  him,  no  enemy  to  give  tone  to  his  life. 
Compelled  to  live  in  himself  alone,  having  no  one  to  share  his 
subtle  raptures,  he  may  have  hoped  to  solve  the  problem  of 
his  destiny  by  a  life  of  ecstasy,  adopting  an  almost  vegetative 
attitude,  like  an  anchorite  of  the  early  church,  and  abdicating 
the  empire  of  the  intellectual  world. 

This  letter  seems  to  hint  at  such  a  scheme,  which  is  a  temp- 
tation to  all  lofty  souls  at  periods  of  social  reform.  But  is 
not  this  purpose,  in  some  cases,  the  result  of  a  vocation  ?  Do 
not  some  of  them  endeavor  to  concentrate  their  powers  by 
long  silence,  so  as  to  emerge  fully  capable  of  governing  the 
world  by  word  or  by  deed  ?  Louis  must,  assuredly,  have 
found  much  bitterness  in  his  intercourse  with  men,  or  have 
striven  hard  with  society  in  terrible  irony,  without  extracting 
anything  from  it,  before  uttering  so  strident  a  cry,  and  ex- 
pressing, poor  fellow,  the  desire  which  satiety  of  power  and 
of  all  earthly  things  has  led  even  monarchs  to  indulge ! 

And  perhaps,  too,  he  went  back  to  solitude  to  carry  out 
some  great  work  that  was  floating  inchoate  in  his  brain. 
We  would  gladly  believe  it  as  we  read  this  fragment  of  his 
thoughts,  betraying  the  struggle  of  his  soul  at  the  time  when 
youth  was  ending  and  the  terrible  power  of  production  was 
coming  into  being,  to  which  we  might  have  owed  the  works 
of  the  man. 

This  letter  connects  itself  with  the  adventure  at  the  theatre. 
The  incident  and  the  letter  throw  light  on  each  other,  body 
and  soul  were  tuned  to  the  same  pitch.  This  tempest  of 
doubts  and  asseverations,  of  clouds  and  of  lightnings  that  flash 
before  the  thunder,  ending  by  a  starved  yearning  for  heavenly 
illumination,  throws  such  a  light  on  the  third  phase  of  his 
education  as  enables  us  to  understand  it  perfectly.  As  we 
read  these  lines,  written  at  chance  moments,  taken  up  when 


222  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

the  vicissitudes  of  life  in  Paris  allowed,  may  we  not  fancy  that 
we  see  an  oak  at  that  stage  of  its  growth  when  its  inner  expan- 
sion bursts  the  tender  green  bark,  covering  it  with  wrinkles 
and  cracks,  when  its  majestic  stature  is  in  preparation — if 
indeed  the  lightnings  of  heaven  and  the  axe  of  man  shall 
spare  it? 

This  letter,  then,  will  close,  alike  for  the  poet  and  the 
philosopher,  this  portentous  childhood  and  unappreciated 
youth.  It  finishes  off  the  outline  of  this  nature  in  its  germ. 
Philosophers  will  regret  the  foliage  frost-nipped  in  the  bud ; 
but  they  will,  perhaps,  find  the  flowers  expanding  in  regions 
far  above  the  highest  places  of  the  earth. 

"PARIS,  September- October,  1819. 

"DEAR  UNCLE: — I  shall  soon  be  leaving  this  part  of  the 
world,  where  I  could  never  bear  to  live.  I  find  no  one  here 
who  likes  what  I  like,  who  works  at  my  work,  or  is  amazed  at 
what  amazes  me.  Thrown  back  on  myself,  leat'my  heart  out 
in  misery.  My  long  and  patient  study  of  society  here  has 
brought  me  to  melancholy  conclusions,  in  which  doubt  pre- 
dominates. 

"  Here,  money  is  the  mainspring  of  everything.  Money  is 
indispensable,  even  for  going  without  money.  But  though 
that  dross  is  necessary  to  any  one  who  wishes  to  think  in 
peace,  I  have  not  courage  enough  to  make  it  the  sole  motive 
power  of  my  thoughts.  To  make  a  fortune,  I  must  take  up  a 
profession  ;  in  two  words,  I  must,  by  acquiring  some  privilege 
of  position  or  of  self-advertisement,  either  legal  or  ingeniously 
contrived,  purchase  the  right  of  taking  day  by  day  out  of 
somebody  else's  purse  a  certain  sum  which,  by  the  end  of  the 
year,  would  amount  to  a  small  capital  ;  and  this,  in  twenty 
years,  would  hardly  secure  an  income  of  four  or  five  thousand 
francs  to  a  man  who  deals  honestly.  An  advocate,  a  notary, 
a  merchant,  any  recognized  professional,  has  earned  a  living 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  223 

for  his  later  days  in  the  course  of  fifteen  or  sixteen  years  after 
ending  his  apprenticeship. 

"  But  I  have  never  felt  fit  for  work  of  this  kind.  I  prefer 
thought  to  action,  an  idea  to  a  transaction,  contemplation  to 
activity.  I  am  absolutely  devoid  of  the  constant  attention 
indispensable  to  the  making  of  a  fortune.  Any  mercantile 
venture,  any  need  for  using  other  people's  money  would  bring 
me  to  grief,  and  I  should  be  ruined.  Though  I  have  nothing, 
at  least  at  the  moment,  I  owe  nothing.  The  man  who  gives 
his  life  to  the  achievement  of  great  things  in  the  sphere  of 
intellect  needs  very  little;  still,  though  twenty  sous  a  day 
would  be  enough,  I  do  not  possess  that  small  income  for  my 
laborious  idleness.  When  I  wish  to  cogitate,  want  drives  me 
out  of  the  sanctuary  where  my  mind  has  its  being.  What  is 
to  become  of  me  ? 

"  I  am  not  frightened  at  poverty.  If  it  were  not  that  beg- 
gars are  imprisoned,  branded,  scorned,  I  would  beg,  to  enable 
me  to  solve  at  my  leisure  the  problems  that  haunt  me.  Still, 
this  sublime  resignation,  by  which  I  might  emancipate  my 
mind,  through  abstracting  it  from  my  body,  would  not  serve 
my  end.  I  should  still  need  money  to  devote  myself  to  cer- 
tain experiments.  But  for  that,  I  would  accept  the  outward 
indigence  of  a  sage  possessed  of  both  heaven  and  earth.  A 
man  need  only  never  stoop,  to  remain  lofty  in  poverty.  He 
who  struggles  and  endures,  while  marching  on  to  a  glorious 
end,  presents  a  noble  spectacle ;  but  who  can  have  the  strength 
to  fight  here  ?  We  can  climb  cliffs,  but  it  is  unendurable  to 
remain  for  ever  tramping  the  mud.  Everything  here  checks 
the  flight  of  a  spirit  that  strives  toward  the  future. 

"  I  should  not  be  afraid  of  myself  in  a  desert  cave ;  I  am 
afraid  of  myself  here.  In  the  desert  I  should  be  alone  with 
myself,  undisturbed  ;  here  man  has  a  thousand  wants  which 
drag  him  down.  You  go  out  walking,  absorbed  in  dreams; 
the  voice  of  the  beggar  asking  an  alms  brings  you  back  to  this 
world  of  hunger  and  thirst.  You  need  money  only  to  take  a 


224  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

walk.  Your  organs  of  sense,  perpetually  wearied  by  trifles, 
never  get  any  rest.  The  poet's  sensitive  nerves  are  constantly 
shocked,  and  what  ought  to  be  his  glory  becomes  his  torment ; 
his  imagination  is  his  crudest  enemy.  The  injured  workman, 
the  poor  mother  in  childbed,  the  prostitute  who  has  fallen  ill, 
the  foundling,  the  infirm  and  aged — even  vice  and  crime  here 
find  a  refuge  and  charity ;  but  the  world  is  merciless  to  the 
inventor,  to  the  man  who  thinks.  Here  everything  must 
show  an  immediate  and  practical  result.  Fruitless  attempts 
are  mocked  at,  though  they  may  lead  to  the  greatest  discov- 
eries; the  deep  and  untiring  study  that  demands  long  concen- 
tration of  every  faculty  is  not  valued  here.  The  State  might 
pay  talent  as  it  pays  the  bayonet ;  but  it  is  afraid  of  being 
taken  in  by  mere  cleverness,  as  if  genius  could  be  counter- 
feited for  any  length  of  time. 

"  Ah,  my  dear  uncle,  when  monastic  solitude  was  destroyed, 
uprooted  from  its  home  at  the  foot  of  mountains,  under  green 
and  silent  shade,  asylums  ought  to  have  been  provided  for 
those  suffering  souls  who,  by  an  idea,  promote  the  progress 
of  nations  or  prepare  some  new  and  fruitful  development  of 
science. 

"  September  zotk. 

"  The  love  of  study  brought  me  hither,  as  you  know.  I 
have  met  really  learned  men,  amazing  for  the  most  part ;  but 
the  lack  of  unity  in  scientific  work  almost  nullifies  their  efforts. 
There  is  no  Head  of  instruction  or  of  scientific  research.  At 
the  Museum  a  professor  argues  to  prove  that  another  in  the 
Rue  Saint- Jacques  talks  nonsense.  The  lecturer  at  the  Col- 
lege of  Medicine  abuses  him  of  the  College  of  France.  When 
I  first  arrived,  I  went  to  hear  an  old  Academician  who  taught 
five  hundred  youths  that  Corneille  was  a  haughty  and  powerful 
genius;  Racine,  elegiac  and  graceful;  Moliere,  inimitable; 
Voltaire,  supremely  witty ;  Bossuet  and  Pascal,  incomparable 
in  argument.  A  professor  of  philosophy  may  make  a  name 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  225 

by  explaining  how  Plato  is  Platonic.  Another  discourses  on 
the  history  of  words,  without  troubling  himself  about  ideas. 
One  explains  ^Eschylus ;  another  tells  you  that  communes  were 
communes,  and  neither  more  nor  less.  These  original  and 
brilliant  discoveries,  diluted  to  last  several  hours,  constitute 
the  higher  education  which  is  to  lead  to  giant  strides  in  human 
knowledge. 

"  If  the  Government  could  have  an  idea,  I  should  suspect 
it  of  being  afraid  of  any  real  superiority,  which,  once  roused, 
might  bring  Society  under  the  yoke  of  an  intelligent  rule. 
Then  nations  would  go  too  far  and  too  fast ;  so  professors  are 
appointed  to  produce  simpletons.  How  else  can  we  account 
for  a  scheme  devoid  of  method  or  any  notion  of  the  future  ? 

"  The  Institute  might  be  the  central  government  of  the 
moral  and  intellectual  world ;  but  it  has  been  ruined  lately  by 
its  subdivision  into  separate  academies.  So  human  science 
marches  on,  without  a  guide,  without  a  system,  and  floats  hap- 
hazard with  no  road  traced  out. 

"  This  vagueness  and  uncertainty  prevails  in  politics  as  well 
as  in  science.  In  the  order  of  nature  means  are  simple,  the 
end  is  grand  and  marvelous ;  here  in  science,  as  in  govern- 
ment, the  means  are  stupendous,  the  end  is  mean.  The  force 
which  in  nature  proceeds  at  an  equal  pace,  and  of  which  the 
sum  is  constantly  being  added  to  itself — the  A-f-  A  from  which 
everything  is  produced — is  destructive  in  society.  Politics, 
at  the  present  time,  place  human  forces  in  antagonism  to  neu- 
tralize each  other,  instead  of  combining  them  to  promote  their 
action  to  some  definite  end. 

"Looking  at  Europe  alone — from  Caesar  to  Constantine, 
from  the  puny  Constantine  to  the  great  Attila,  from  the  Huns 
to  Charlemagne,  from  Charlemagne  to  Leo  X.,  from  Leo  X.  to 
Philip  II.,  from  Philip  II.  to  Louis  XIV.,  from  Venice  to 
England,  from  England  to  Napoleon,  from  Napoleon  to  Eng- 
land— I  see  no  fixed  purpose  in  politics ;  its  constant  agitation 
has  led  to  no  progress. 
15 


226  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

"  Nations  leave  witnesses  to  their  greatness  in  monuments, 
and  to  their  happiness  in  the  welfare  of  individuals.  Are 
modern  monuments  as  fine  as  those  of  the  ancients?  I  doubt 
it.  The  arts,  which  are  the  direct  outcome  of  the  individual, 
the  products  of  genius  or  of  handicraft,  have  not  advanced 
much.  The  pleasures  of  Lucullus  were  as  good  as  those  of 
Samuel  Bernard,  of  Beaujon,  or  of  the  King  of  Bavaria.  And 
then  human  longevity  has  diminished. 

"  Thus,  to  those  who  will  be  candid,  man  is  still  the  same  ; 
might  is  still  his  only  law  and  success  his  only  wisdom. 

"  Jesus  Christ,  Mahomet,  and  Luther  only  lent  a  different 
hue  to  the  arena  in  which  youthful  nations  disport  them- 
selves. 

"  No  development  of  politics  has  hindered  civilization,  with 
its  riches,  its  manners,  its  alliance  of  the  strong  against  the 
weak,  its  ideas,  and  its  delights,  from  moving  from  Memphis 
to  Tyre,  from  Tyre  to  Baalbek,  from  Tadmor  to  Carthage, 
from  Carthage  to  Rome,  from  Rome  to  Constantinople,  from 
Constantinople  to  Venice,  from  Venice  to  Spain,  from  Spain 
to  England — while  no  trace  is  left  of  Memphis,  of  Tyre,  of 
Carthage,  of  Rome,  of  Venice,  or  Madrid.  The  soul  of  those 
great  bodies  has  fled.  Not  one  of  them  has  preserved  itself 
from  destruction,  nor  formulated  this  axiom :  When  the  effect 
produced  ceases  to  be  in  a  ratio  to  its  cause,  disorganization 
follows. 

"  The  most  subtle  genius  can  discover  no  common  bond 
between  great  social  facts.  No  political  theory  has  ever  lasted. 
Governments  pass  away,  as  men  do,  without  handing  down 
any  lesson,  and  no  system  gives  birth  to  a  system  better  than 
that  which  came  before  it.  What  can  we  say  about  politics 
when  a  Government  directly  referred  to  God  perished  in 
India  and  Egypt ;  when  the  rule  of  the  Sword  and  of  the  Tiara 
are  past ;  when  monarchy  is  dying  ;  when  the  Government  of 
the  People  has  never  been  alive  ;  when  no  scheme  of  intellec- 
tual power  as  applied  to  material  interests  has  ever  proved 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  227 

durable,  and  everything  at  this  day  remains  to  be  done  all  over 
again,  as  it  has  been  at  every  period  when  man  has  turned  to 
cry  out :  '  I  am  in  torment ! ' 

"  The  code,  which  is  considered  Napoleon's  greatest  achieve- 
ment, is  the  most  Draconian  work  I  know  of.  Territorial 
subdivision  carried  out  to  the  uttermost,  and  its  principle  con- 
firmed by  the  equal  division  of  property  generally,  must  result 
in  the  degeneracy  of  the  nation  and  the  death  of  the  Arts  and 
Sciences.  The  land,  too  much  broken  up,  is  cultivated  only 
with  cereals  and  small  crops ;  the  forests,  and  consequently  the 
rivers,  are  disappearing ;  oxen  and  horses  are  no  longer  bred. 
Means  are  lacking  both  for  attack  and  for  resistance.  If  we 
should  be  invaded,  the  people  must  be  crushed ;  it  has  lost  its 
mainspring — its  leaders.  This  is  the  history  of  deserts ! 

"Thus  the  science  of  politics  has  no  definite  principles, 
and  it  can  have  no  fixity ;  it  is  the  spirit  of  the  hour,  the  per- 
petual application  of  strength  proportioned  to  the  necessities 
of  the  moment.  The  man  who  should  foresee  two  centuries 
ahead  would  die  at  the  place  of  execution,  loaded  with  the 
imprecations  of  the  mob,  or  else — which  seems  worse — would 
be  lashed  with  the  myriad  whips  of  ridicule.  Nations  are 
but  individuals,  neither  wiser  nor  stronger  than  man,  and  their 
destinies  are  identical.  If  we  reflect  on  man,  is  not  that  to 
consider  mankind  ? 

"  By  studying  the  spectacle  of  society  perpetually  storm- 
tossed  in  its  foundations  as  well  as  in  its  results,  in  its  causes 
as  well  as  in  its  actions,  while  philanthropy  is  but  a  splendid 
mistake,  and  progress  is  vanity,  I  have  been  confirmed  in 
this  truth :  Life  is  within  and  not  without  us ;  to  rise  above 
men,  to  govern  them,  is  only  the  part  of  an  aggrandized 
schoolmaster ;  and  those  men  who  are  capable  of  rising  to 
the  level  whence  they  can  enjoy  a  view  of  the  world  should 
not  look  at  their  own  feet. 


228  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 


"  November  ajh. 

"  I  am  no  doubt  occupied  with  weighty  thoughts,  I  am  on 
the  way  to  certain  discoveries,  an  invincible  power  bears  me 
toward  a  luminary  which  shone  at  an  early  age  on  the  dark- 
ness of  my  moral  life ;  but  what  name  can  I  give  to  the  power 
that  ties  my  hands  and  shuts  my  mouth,  and  drags  me  in  a 
direction  opposite  to  my  vocation  ?  I  must  leave  Paris,  bid 
farewell  to  the  books  in  the  libraries,  those  noble  centres  of 
illumination,  those  kindly  and  always  accessible  sages,  and  the 
younger  geniuses  with  whom  I  sympathize.  Who  is  it  that 
drives  me  away  ?  Chance  or  providence  ? 

"  The  two  ideas  represented  by  those  words  are  irrecon- 
cilable. If  chance  does  not  exist,  we  must  admit  fatalism, 
that  is  to  say,  the  compulsory  coordination  of  things  under  the 
rule  of  a  general  plan.  Why  then  do  we  rebel  ?  If  man  is 
not  free,  what  becomes  of  the  scaffolding  of  his  moral  sense  ? 
Or,  if  he  can  control  his  destiny,  if  by  his  own  free-will  he 
can  interfere  with  the  execution  of  the  general  plan,  what 
becomes  of  God  ? 

"Why  did  I  come  here?  If  I  examine  myself,  I  find  the 
answer  :  I  find  in  myself  axioms  that  need  developing.  But 
why  then  have  I  such  vast  faculties  without  being  suffered  to 
use  them  ?  If  my  suffering  could  serve  as  an  example,  I  could 
understand  it;  but  no,  I  suffer  unknown. 

"This  is,  perhaps,  as  much  the  act  of  Providence  as  the 
fate  of  the  flower  that  dies  unseen  in  the  heart  of  the  virgin 
forest,  where  no  one  can  enjoy  its  perfume  or  admire  its 
splendor.  Just  as  that  blossom  vainly  sheds  its  fragrance  to 
the  solitude,  so  do  I,  here  in  a  garret,  give  birth  to  ideas  that 
no  one  can  grasp. 

"Yesterday  evening  I  sat  eating  bread  and  grapes  in  front 
of  my  window  with  a  young  doctor  named  Meyraux.  We 
talked  as  men  do  whom  misfortune  has  joined  in  brotherhood, 
and  I  said  to  him — 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  229 

"  '  I  am  going  away ;  you  are  staying.  Take  up  my  ideas 
and  develop  them.' 

"'I  cannot!'  said  he,  with  bitter  regret;  'my  feeble 
health  cannot  stand  so  much  work,  and  I  shall  die  young  of 
my  struggle  with  penury.' 

"  We  looked  up  at  the  sky  and  grasped  hands.  We  first  met 
at  the  Comparative  Anatomy  course,  and  in  the  galleries  of 
the  Museum,  attracted  thither  by  the  same  study — the  unity 
of  geological  structure.  In  him  this  was  the  presentiment  of 
genius  sent  to  open  a  new  path  in  the  fallows  of  intellect;  in 
me  it  was  a  deduction  from  a  general  system. 

"My  point  is  to  ascertain  the  real  relation  that  may  exist 
between  God  and  man.  Is  not  this  a  need  of  the  age? 
Without  the  highest  assurance,  it  is  impossible  to  put  bit  and 
bridle  on  the  social  factions  that  have  been  let  loose  by  the 
spirit  of  skepticism  and  discussion,  and  which  are  now  crying 
aloud :  '  Show  us  a  way  in  which  we  may  walk  and  find  no 
pitfalls  in  our  path  1 ' 

"You  will  wonder  what  comparative  anatomy  has  to  do 
with  a  question  of  such  importance  to  the  future  of  society. 
Must  we  not  attain  to  the  conviction  that  man  is  the  end  of 
all  earthly  means  before  we  ask  whether  he  too  is  not  the 
means  to  some  end  ?  If  man  is  bound  up  with  everything, 
is  there  not  something  above  him  with  which  he  again  is 
bound  up?  If  he  is  the  end-all  of  the  unexplained  transmu- 
tations that  lead  up  to  him,  must  he  not  be  also  the  link 
between  the  visible  and  invisible  creations? 

"The  activity  of  the  universe  is  not  absurd  ;  it  must  tend 
to  an  end,  and  that  end  is  surely  not  a  social  body  constituted 
as  ours  is !  There  is  a  fearful  gulf  between  us  and  heaven. 
In  our  present  existence  we  can  neither  be  always  happy  nor 
always  in  torment ;  must  there  not  be  some  tremendouschange  to 
bring  about  Paradise  and  Hell,  two  images  without  which  God 
cannot  exist  to  the  mind  of  the  vulgar?  I  know  that  a  com- 
promise was  made  by  the  invention  of  the  Soul;  but  it  is  repug- 


230  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

nant  to  me  to  make  God  answerable  for  human  baseness,  for 
our  disenchantments,  our  aversions,  our  degeneracy. 

"Again,  how  can  we  recognize  as  divine  the  principle 
within  us  which  can  be  overthrown  by  a  few  glasses  of  rum? 
How  conceive  of  immaterial  faculties  which  matter  can  con- 
quer, and  whose  exercise  is  suspended  by  a  grain  of  opium  ? 
How  imagine  that  we  shall  be  able  to  feel  when  we  are  bereft 
of  the  vehicles  of  sensation  ?  Why  must  God  perish  if  matter 
can  be  proved  to  think  ?  Is  the  vitality  of  matter  in  its  innu- 
merable manifestations — the  effect  of  its  instincts — at  all  more 
explicable  than  the  effects  of  the  mind?  Is  not  the  motion 
given  to  the  worlds  enough  to  prove  God's  existence,  without 
our  plunging  into  absurd  speculations  suggested  by  pride? 
And  if  we  pass,  after  our  trials,  from  a  perishable  state  of 
being  to  a  higher  existence,  is  not  that  enough  for  a  creature 
that  is  distinguished  from  other  creatures  only  by  more  perfect 
instincts?  If  in  moral  philosophy  there  is  not  a  single  prin- 
ciple which  does  not  lead  to  the  absurd,  or  cannot  be  dis- 
proved by  evidence,  is  it  not  high  time  that  we  should  set  to 
work  to  seek  such  dogmas  as  are  written  in  the  innermost 
nature  of  things?  Must  we  not  reverse  philosophical  science  ? 

"We  trouble  ourselves  very  little  about  the  supposed  void 
that  must  have  preexisted  for  us.  and  we  try  to  fathom  the 
supposed  void  that  lies  before  us.  We  make  God  responsible 
for  the  future,  but  we  do  not  expect  Him  to  account  for  the 
past.  And  yet  it  is  quite  as  desirable  to  know  whether  we 
have  any  roots  in  the  past  as  to  discover  whether  we  are 
inseparable  from  the  future. 

"We  have  been  deists  or  atheists  in  one  direction  only. 

"  Is  the  world  eternal  ?  Was  the  world  created  ?  We  can 
conceive  of  no  middle  term  between  these  two  propositions ; 
one,  then,  is  true  and  the  other  false !  Take  your  choice. 
Whichever  it  may  be,  God,  as  our  reason  depicts  Him,  must 
be  deposed,  and  that  amounts  to  denial.  The  world  is  eternal : 
then,  beyond  question,  God  has  had  it  forced  upon  Him. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  231 

The  world  was  created  j  then  God  is  an  impossibility.  How 
could  He  have  subsisted  through  an  eternity,  not  knowing  that 
He  would  presently  want  to  create  the  world  ?  How  could 
He  have  failed  to  foresee  all  the  results? 

"Whence  did  He  derive  the  essence  of  creation?  Evi- 
dently from  Himself.  If,  then,  the  world  proceeds  from 
God,  how  can  you  account  for  evil  ?  That  Evil  should  pro- 
ceed from  Good  is  absurd.  If  evil  does  not  exist,  what  do 
you  make  of  social  life  and  its  laws  ?  On  all  hands  we  find 
a  precipice !  On  every  side  a  gulf  in  which  reason  is  lost ! 
Then  social  science  must  be  altogether  reconstructed. 

"Listen  to  me,  uncle;  until  some  splendid  genius  shall 
have  taken  account  of  the  obvious  inequality  of  intellects  and 
the  general  sense  of  humanity,  the  word  God  will  be  con- 
stantly arraigned,  and  Society  will  rest  on  shifting  sands. 
The  secret  of  the  various  moral  zones  through  which  man 
passes  will  be  discovered  by  the  analysis  of  the  animal  type 
as  a  whole.  That  animal  type  has  hitherto  been  studied  with 
reference  only  to  its  differences,  not  to  its  similitudes;  in  its 
organic  manifestations,  not  in  its  faculties.  Animal  faculties 
are  perfected  in  direct  transmission,  in  obedience  to  laws 
which  remain  to  be  discovered.  These  faculties  correspond 
to  the  forces  which  express  them,  and  those  forces  are  essen- 
tially material  and  divisible. 

"  Material  faculties  !  Reflect  on  this  juxtaposition  of  words. 
Is  not  this  a  problem  as  insoluble  as  that  of  the  first  communi- 
cation of  motion  to  matter — an  unsounded  gulf  of  which  the 
difficulties  were  transposed  rather  than  removed  by  Newton's 
system  ?  Again,  the  universal  assimilation  of  light  by  every- 
thing that  exists  on  earth  demands  a  new  study  of  our  globe. 
The  same  animal  differs  in  the  tropics  of  India  and  in  the 
North.  Under  the  angular  or  the  vertical  incidence  of  the 
sun's  rays  nature  is  developed  the  same,  but  not  the  same; 
identical  in  its  principles,  but  totally  dissimilar  in  its  outcome. 
The  phenomenon  that  amazes  our  eyes  in  the  zoological  world 


232  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

when  we  compare  the  butterflies  of  Brazil  with  those  of  Eu- 
rope, is  even  more  startling  in  the  world  of  Mind.  A  par- 
ticular facial  angle,  a  certain  amount  of  brain  convolutions, 
are  indispensable  to  produce  Columbus,  Raphael,  Napoleon, 
Laplace,  or  Beethoven  ;  the  sunless  valley  produces  the  cretin 
— draw  your  own  conclusions.  Why  such  differences,  due  to 
the  more  or  less  ample  diffusion  of  light  to  men  ?  The  masses 
of  suffering  humanity,  more  or  less  active,  fed,  and  enlight- 
ened, are  a  difficulty  to  be  accounted  for,  crying  out  against 
God. 

"  Why  in  great  joy  do  we  always  want  to  quit  the  earth? 
whence  comes  the  longing  to  rise  which  every  creature  has 
known  or  will  know?  Motion  is  a  great  Soul,  and  its  alliance 
with  matter  is  just  as  difficult  to  account  for  as  the  origin  of 
thought  in  man.  In  these  days  science  is  one ;  it  is  impossi- 
ble to  touch  politics  independent  of  moral  questions,  and 
these  are  bound  up  with  scientific  questions.  It  seems  to  me 
that  we  are  on  the  eve  of  a  great  human  struggle ;  the  forces 
are  there ;  only  I  do  not  see  the  general. 

"  November  25. 

"  Believe  me,  dear  uncle,  it  is  hard  to  give  up  the  life  that 
is  in  us  without  a  pang.  I  am  returning  to  Blois  with  a 
heavy  grip  at  my  heart ;  I  shall  die  then,  taking  with  me 
some  useful  truths.  No  personal  interest  debases  my  regrets. 
Is  earthly  fame  a  guerdon  to  those  who  believe  that  they  will 
mount  to  a  higher  sphere  ? 

"  I  am  by  no  means  in  love  with  the  two  syllables  Lam 
and  bert;  whether  spoken  with  respect  or  with  contempt  over 
my  grave,  they  can  make  no  change  in  my  ultimate  destiny. 
I  feel  myself  strong  and  energetic  ;  I  might  become  a  power ; 
I  feel  in  myself  a  life  so  luminous  that  it  might  enlighten  a 
world,  and  yet  I  am  shut  up  in  a  sort  of  mineral,  as  perhaps 
indeed  are  the  colors  you  admire  on  the  neck  of  an  Indian 
bird.  I  should  need  to  embrace  the  whole  world,  to  clasp 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  233 

and  recreate  it ;  but  those  who  have  done  this,  who  have 
thus  embraced  and  remoulded  it,  began — did  they  not  ? — by 
being  a  wheel  in  the  machine.  I  can  only  be  crushed.  Ma- 
homet had  the  sword ;  Jesus  had  the  cross ;  I  shall  die  un- 
known. I  shall  be  at  Blois  for  a  day,  and  then  in  my  coffin. 

"  Do  you  know  why  I  have  come  back  to  Swedenborg  after 
vast  studies  of  all  religions,  and  after  proving  to  myself,  by 
reading  all  the  works  published  within  the  last  sixty  years  by 
the  patient  English,  by  Germany,  and  by  France,  how  deeply 
true  were  my  youthful  views  about  the  Bible  ?  Swedenborg 
undoubtedly  epitomizes  all  the  religions — or  rather  the  one 
religion — of  humanity.  Though  forms  of  worship  are  infi- 
nitely various,  neither  their  true  meaning  nor  their  metaphysi- 
cal interpretation  has  ever  varied.  In  short,  man  has,  and 
has  had,  but  one  religion. 

"  Sivaism,  Vishnuism,  and  Brahmanism,  the  three  primitive 
creeds,  originating  as  they  did  in  Thibet,  in  the  valley  of  the 
Indus,  and  on  the  vast  plains  of  the  Ganges,  ended  their  war- 
fare some  thousand  years  before  the  birth  of  Christ  by  adopt- 
ing the  Hindoo  Trimourti.  The  Trimourti  is  our  Trinity. 
From  this  dogma  Magianism  arose  in  Persia ;  in  Egypt,  the 
African  beliefs  and  the  Mosaic  law ;  the  worship  of  the  Cabiri, 
and  the  polytheism  of  Greece  and  Rome.  While  by  thi«  rami- 
fication of  the  Trimourti  the  Asiatic  myths  became  adapted  to 
the  imaginations  of  various  races  in  the  lands  they  reached  by 
the  agency  of  certain  sages  whom  men  elevated  to  be  demi- 
gods— Mithra,  Bacchus,  Hermes,  Hercules,  and  the  rest — 
Buddha,  the  great 'reformer  of  the  three  primeval  religions, 
lived  in  India,  and  founded  his  church  there,  a  sect  which 
still  numbers  two  hundred  millions  more  believers  than  Chris- 
tianity can  show,  while  it  certainly  influenced  the  powerful 
Will  both  of  Jesus  and  of  Confucius. 

"Then  Christianity  raised  her  standard.  Subsequently 
Mahomet  fused  Judaism  and  Christianity,  the  Bible  and  the 
Gospel,  in  one  book,  the  Koran,  adapting  them  to  the  appre- 


234  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

hension  of  the  Arab  race.  Finally,  Swedenborg  borrowed 
from  Magianism,  Brahmanism,  Buddhism,  and  Christian  mys- 
ticism all  the  truth  and  divine  beauty  that  those  four  great 
religious  books  hold  in  common,  and  added  to  them  a  doc- 
trine, a  basis  of  reasoning,  that  may  be  termed  mathematical. 

"Any  man  who  plunges  into  those  religious  waters,  of 
which  the  sources  are  not  all  known,  will  find  proofs  that 
Zoroaster,  Moses,  Buddha,  Confucius,  Jesus  Christ,  and  Swe- 
denborg had  identical  principles  and  aimed  at  identical  ends. 

"The  last  of  them  all,  Swedenborg,  will  perhaps  be  the 
Buddha  of  the  North.  Obscure  and  diffuse  as  his  writings 
are,  we  find  in  them  the  elements  of  a  magnificent  conception 
of  society.  His  Theocracy  is  sublime,  and  his  creed  is  the 
only  acceptable  one  to  superior  souls.  He  alone  brings  man 
into  immediate  communion  with  God,  he  gives  a  thirst  for 
God,  he  has  freed  the  Majesty  of  God  from  the  trappings  in 
which  other  human  dogmas  have  disguised  Him.  He  left 
Him  where  He  is,  making  His  myriad  creations  and  creatures 
gravitate  toward  Him  through  successive  transformations 
which  promise  a  more  immediate  and  more  natural  future 
than  the  Catholic  idea  of  Eternity.  Swedenborg  has  absolved 
God  from  the  reproach  attaching  to  Him  in  the  estimation  of 
tender  souls  for  the  perpetuity  of  revenge  to  punish  the  sin  of 
a  moment — a  system  of  injustice  and  cruelty. 

"  Each  man  may  know  for  himself  what  hope  he  has  of  life 
eternal,  and  whether  this  world  has  any  rational  sense.  I 
mean  to  make  the  attempt.  And  this  attempt  may  save  the 
world,  just  as  much  as  the  cross  at  Jerusalem  or  the  sword  at 
Mecca.  These  were  both  the  offspring  of  the  desert.  Of  the 
thirty-three  years  of  Christ's  life,  we  only  know  the  history  of 
nine  ;  His  life  of  seclusion  prepared  Him  for  His  life  of  glory. 
And  I  too  crave  for  the  desert !  " 

Notwithstanding  the  difficulties  of  the  task,  I  have  felt  it 
my  duty  to  depict  Lambert's  boyhood,  the  unknown  life  to 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  236 

which  I  owe  the  only  happy  hours,  the  only  pleasant  memories, 
of  my  early  days.  Excepting  during  those  two  years  I  had 
nothing  but  annoyances  and  weariness.  Though  some  happi- 
ness was  mine  at  a  later  time,  it  was  always  incomplete. 

I  have  been  diffuse,  I  know ;  but  in  default  of  entering  into 
the  whole  wide  heart  and  brain  of  Louis  Lambert — two  words 
which  inadequately  express  the  infinite  aspects  of  his  inner 
life — it  would  be  almost  impossible  to  make  the  second  part 
of  his  intellectual  history  intelligible — a  phase  that  was  un- 
known to  the  world  and  to  me,  but  of  which  the  mystical  out- 
come was  made  evident  to  my  eyes  in  the  course  of  a  few 
hours.  Those  who  have  not  already  dropped  this  volume  will, 
I  hope,  understand  the  events  I  still  have  to  tell,  forming  as 
they  do  a  sort  of  second  existence  lived  by  this  creature — may 
I  not  say  this  creation  ? — in  whom  everything  was  to  be  so 
extraordinary,  even  his  end. 

When  Louis  returned  to  Blois,  his  uncle  was  eager  to  pro- 
cure him  some  amusement ;  but  the  poor  priest  was  regarded 
as  a  perfect  leper  in  that  godly-minded  town.  No  one  would 
have  anything  to  say  to  a  revolutionary  who  had  taken  the 
oaths.  His  society,  therefore,  consisted  of  a  few  individuals 
of  what  were  then  called  liberal  or  patriotic,  or  constitutional 
opinions,  on  whom  he  would  call  for  a  rubber  of  whist  or  of 
boston. 

At  the  first  house  where  he  was  introduced  by  his  uncle, 
Louis  met  a  young  lady  whose  circumstances  obliged  her  to 
remain  in  this  circle,  so  contemned  by  those  of  the  fashionable 
world,  though  her  fortune  was  such  as  to  make  it  probable  that 
she  might  by-and-by  marry  into  the  highest  aristocracy  of  the 
province.  Mademoiselle  Pauline  de  Villenoix  was  sole  heiress 
to  the  wealth  amassed  by  her  grandfather,  a  Jew  named  Salo- 
mon, who,  contrary  to  the  customs  of  his  nation,  had,  in  his 
old  age,  married  a  Christian  and  a  Catholic.  He  had  an  only 
son,  who  was  brought  up  in  his  mother's  faith.  At  his  father's 
death  young  Salomon  purchased  what  was  known  at  that 


236  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

time  as  a  savonnette  a  vilain  (literally  a  cake  of  soap  for  a 
serf),  a  small  estate  called  Villenoix,  which  he  contrived  to 
get  registered  with  a  baronial  title,  and  took  its  name.  He 
died  unmarried,  but  he  left  a  natural  daughter,  to  whom  he 
bequeathed  the  greater  part  of  his  fortune,  including  the  lands 
of  Villenoix.  He  appointed  one  of  his  uncles,  Monsieur 
Joseph  Salomon,  to  be  the  girl's  guardian.  The  old  Jew  was 
so  devoted  to  his  ward  that  he  seemed  willing  to  make  great 
sacrifices  for  the  sake  of  marrying  her  well.  But  Mademoiselle 
de  Villenoix's  birth,  and  the  cherished  prejudice  against  Jews 
that  prevails  in  the  provinces,  would  not  allow  of  her  being 
received  in  the  very  exclusive  circle  which,  rightly  or  wrongly, 
considers  itself  noble,  notwithstanding  her  own  large  fortune 
and  her  guardian's. 

Monsieur  Joseph  Salomon  was  resolved  that  if  she  could 
not  secure  a  country  squire,  his  niece  should  go  to  Paris  and 
make  choice  of  a  husband  among  the  peers  of  France,  liberal 
or  monarchical ;  as  to  happiness,  that  he  believed  he  could 
secure  her  by  the  terms  of  the  marriage-contract. 

Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  was  now  twenty.  Her  remark- 
able beauty  and  gifts  of  mind  were  surer  guarantees  of  happi- 
ness than  those  offered  by  money.  Her  features  were  of  the 
purest  type  of  Jewish  beauty;  the  oval  lines,  so  noble  and 
maidenly,  have  an  indescribable  stamp  of  the  ideal,  and  seem 
to  speak  of  the  joys  of  the  East,  its  unchangeably  blue  sky,  the 
glories  of  its  lands,  and  the  fabulous  riches  of  life  there.  She 
had  fine  eyes,  shaded  by  deep  eyelids,  fringed  with  thick, 
curled  lashes.  Biblical  innocence  sat  on  her  brow.  Her 
complexion  was  of  the  pure -whiteness  of  the  Levite's  robe. 
She  was  habitually  silent  and  thoughtful,  but  her  movements 
and  gestures  betrayed  a  quiet  grace,  as  her  speech  bore  witness 
to  a  woman's  sweet  and  loving  nature.  She  had  not,  indeed, 
the  rosy  freshness,  the  fruit-like  bloom  which  blush  on  a  girl's 
cheek  during  her  careless  years.  Darker  shadows,  with  here 
and  there  a  redder  vein,  took  the  place  of  color,  symptomatic 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  237 

of  an  energetic  temper  and  nervous  irritability,  such  as  many 
men  do  not  like  to  meet  with  in  a  wife,  while  to  others  they 
are  an  indication  of  the  most  sensitive  chastity  and  passion 
mingled  with  pride. 

As  soon  as  Louis  saw  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix,  he  dis- 
cerned the  angel  within.  The  richest  powers  of  his  soul,  and  his 
tendency  to  ecstatic  reverie,  every  faculty  within  him  was  at  once 
concentrated  in  boundless  love,  the  first  love  of  a  young  man, 
a  passion  which  is  strong  indeed  in  all,  but  which  in  him  was 
raised  to  incalculable  power  by  the  perennial  ardor  of  his 
senses,  the  character  of  his  ideas,  and  the  manner  in  which 
he  lived.  This  passion  became  a  gulf,  into  which  the  hapless 
fellow  threw  everything ;  a  gulf  whither  the  mind  dare  not 
venture,  since  his,  flexible  and  firm  as  it  was,  was  lost  there. 
There  all  was  mysterious,  for  everything  went  on  in  that  moral 
world,  closed  to  most  men,  whose  laws  were  revealed  to  him 
— perhaps  to  his  sorrow. 

When  an  accident  threw  me  in  the  way  of  his  uncle,  the 
good  man  showed  me  into  the  room  in  which  Lambert  had  at 
that  time  lived.  I  wanted  to  find  some  vestiges  of  his  writ- 
ings, if  he  should  have  left  any.  There,  among  his  papers, 
untouched  by  the  old  man  from  that  fine  instinct  of  grief  that 
characterizes  the  aged,  I  found  a  number  of  letters,  too  illegi- 
ble ever  to  have  been  sent  to  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix. 
My  familiarity  with  Lambert's  writing  enabled  me  in  time  to 
decipher  the  hieroglyphics  of  this  shorthand,  the  result  of 
impatience  and  a  frenzy  of  passion.  Carried  away  by  his 
feelings,  he  had  written  without  being  conscious  of  the  irregu- 
larity of  words  too  slow  to  express  his  thoughts.  He  must 
have  been  compelled  to  copy  these  chaotic  attempts,  for  the 
lines  often  ran  into  each  other;  but  he  was  also  afraid,  per- 
haps, of  not  having  sufficiently  disguised  his  feelings,  and  at 
first,  at  any  rate,  he  had  probably  written  his  love-letters  twice 
over. 

It  required  all  the  fervency  of  my  devotion  to  his  memory, 


238  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

and  the  sort  of  fanaticism  which  comes  of  such  a  task,  to 
enable  me  to  divine  and  restore  the  meaning  of  the  five  letters 
that  here  follow.  These  documents,  preserved  by  me  with 
pious  care,  are  the  only  material  evidence  of  his  overmastering 
passion.  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  has  no  doubt  destroyed 
the  real  letters  that  she  received,  eloquent  witnesses  to  the 
delirium  she  inspired. 

The  first  of  these  papers,  evidently  a  rough  sketch,  betrays 
by  its  style  and  by  its  length  the  many  emendations,  the 
heartfelt  alarms,  the  innumerable  terrors  caused  by  a  desire 
to  please;  the  changes  of  expression  and  the  hesitation 
between  the  whirl  of  ideas  that  beset  a  man  as  he  indites  his 
first  love-letter — a-  letter  he  never  will  forget,  each  line  the 
result  of  a  reverie,  each  word  the  subject  of  long  cogitation, 
while  the  most  unbridled  passion  known  to  man  feels  the 
necessity  of  the  most  reserved  utterance,  and,  like  a  giant 
stooping  to  enter  a  hovel,  speaks  humbly  and  low,  so  as  not 
to  alarm  a  girl's  soul. 

No  antiquary  ever  handled  his  palimpsests  with  greater 
respect  than  I  showed  in  reconstructing  these  mutilated  docu- 
ments of  such  joy  and  suffering  as  must  always  be  sacred  to 
those  who  have  known  similar  joy  and  grief. 


"  Mademoiselle,  when  you  have  read  this  letter,  if  you  ever 
should  read  it,  my  life  will  be  in  your  hands,  for  I  love  you : 
and  to  me,  the  hope  of  being  loved  is  life.  Others,  perhaps, 
ere  now,  have,  in  speaking  of  themselves,  misused  the  words 
I  must  employ  to  depict  the  state  of  my  soul ;  yet  I  beseech 
you  to  believe  in  the  truth  of  my  expressions ;  though  weak, 
they  are  sincere.  Perhaps  I  ought  not  thus  to  proclaim  my 
love.  Indeed,  my  heart  counseled  me  to  wait  in  silence  till 
my  passion  should  touch  you,  that  I  might  the  better  conceal 
it  if  its  silent  demonstrations  should  displease  you ;  or  till  I 
could  express  it  even  more  delicately  than  in  words  if  I  found 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  239 

favor  in  your  eyes.  However,  after  having  listened  for  long 
to  the  coy  fears  that  fill  a  youthful  heart  with  alarms,  I  write 
in  obedience  to  the  instinct  which  drags  useless  lamentations 
from  the  dying. 

"  It  has  needed  all  my  courage  to  silence  the  pride  of  pov- 
erty, and  to  overleap  the  barriers  which  prejudice  erects  be- 
tween you  and  me.  I  have  had  to  smother  many  reflections 
to  love  you  in  spite  of  your  wealth ;  and  as  I  write  to  you,  am 
I  not  in  danger  of  the  scorn  which  women  often  reserve  for 
professions  of  love,  which  they  accept  only  as  one  more  tribute 
of  flattery?  But  we  cannot  help  rushing  with  all  our  might 
toward  happiness,  or  being  attracted  to  the  life  of  love  as  a 
plant  is  to  the  light ;  we  must  have  been  very  unhappy  before 
we  can  conquer  the  torment,  the  anguish,  of  those  secret  de- 
liberations when  reason  proves  to  us  ty  a  thousand  arguments 
how  barren  our  yearning  must  be  if  it  remains  buried  in  our 
hearts,  and  when  hopes  bid  us  dare  all  things. 

"  I  was  happy  when  I  admired  you  in  silence  ;  I  was  so  lost 
in  the  contemplation  of  your  beautiful  soul,  that  only  to  see 
you  left  me  hardly  anything  further  to  imagine.  And  I  should 
not  now  have  dared  to  address  you  if  I  had  not  heard  that  you 
were  leaving.  What  misery  has  that  one  word  brought  upon 
me  !  Indeed,  it  is  my  despair  that  has  shown  me  the  extent 
of  my  attachment — it  is  unbounded.  Mademoiselle,  you  will 
never  know — at  least,  I  hope  you  may  never  know — the  an- 
guish of  dreading  lest  you  should  lose  the  only  happiness  that 
has  dawned  upon  you  on  earth,  the  only  thing  that  has  thrown 
a  gleam  of  light  into  the  darkness  of  misery.  I  understood 
yesterday  that  my  life  was  no  more  in  myself,  but  in  you. 
There  is  but  one  woman  in  the  world  for  me,  as  there  is  but 
one  thought  in  my  soul.  I  dare  not  tell  you  to  what  a  state  I 
am  reduced  by  my  love  for  you.  I  would  have  you  only  as  a 
gift  from  yourself;  I  must  therefore  avoid  showing  myself  to 
you  in  all  the  attractiveness  of  dejection — for  is  it  not  often 
more  impressive  to  a  noble  soul  than  that  of  good-fortune  ? 


240  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

There  are  many  things  I  may  not  tell  you.  Indeed,  I  have 
too  lofty  a  notion  of  love  to  taint  it  with  ideas  that  are  alien 
to  its  nature.  If  my  soul  is  worthy  of  yours,  and  my  life  pure, 
your  heart  will  have  a  sympathetic  insight,  and  you  will  under- 
stand me  ! 

"It  is  the  fate  of  man  to  offer  himself  to  the  woman  who 
can  make  him  believe  in  happiness  ;  but  it  is  your  prerogative 
to  reject  the  truest  passion  if  it  is  not  in  harmony  with  the 
vague  voices  in  your  heart — that  I  know.  If  my  lot,  as  de- 
cided by  you,  must  be  adverse  to  my  hopes,  mademoiselle,  let 
me  appeal  to  the  delicacy  of  your  maiden  soul  and  the  in- 
genuous compassion  of  a  woman  to  burn  my  letter.  On  my 
knees  I  beseech  you  to  forget  all !  Do  not  mock  at  a  feeling 
that  is  wholly  respectful,  and  that  is  too  deeply  graven  on  my 
heart  ever  to  be  effaced.  Break  my  heart,  but  do  not  rend  it ! 
Let  the  expression  of  my  first  love,  a  pure  and  youthful  love, 
be  lost  in  your  pure  and  youthful  heart !  Let  it  die  there  as 
a  prayer  rises  up  to  die  in  the  bosom  of  God  ! 

"  I  owe  you  much  gratitude:  I  have  spent  delicious  hours 
occupied  in  watching  you,  and  giving  myself  up  to  the  faint 
dreams  of  my  life ;  do  not  crush  these  long  but  transient  joys 
by  some  girlish  irony.  Be  satisfied  not  to  answer  me.  I  shall 
know  how  to  interpret  your  silence ;  you  will  see  me  no  more. 
If  I  must  be  condemned  to  know  for  ever  what  happiness 
means,  and  to  be  for  ever  bereft  of  it ;  if,  like  a  banished 
angel,  I  am  to  cherish  the  sense  of  celestial  joys  while  bound 
for  ever  to  a  world  of  sorrow— well,  I  can  keep  the  secret  of 
my  love  as  well  as  that  of  my  griefs. 

"And  farewell ! 

"Yes,  I  resign  you  to  God,  to  whom  I  will  pray  for  you, 
beseeching  Him  to  grant  you  a  happy  life ;  for  even  if  I  am 
driven  from  your  heart,  into  which  I  have  crept  by  stealth, 
still  I  shall  ever  be  near  you.  Otherwise,  of  what  value 
would  the  sacred  words  be  of  this  letter,  my  first  and  perhaps 
my  last  entreaty  ?  If  I  should  ever  cease  to  think  of  you,  to 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  241 

love  you  whether  in  happiness  or  in  woe,  should  I  not  deserve 
my  punishment  ?  " 

ii. 

"  You  are  not  going  away  !  And  I  am  loved  !  I,  a  poor, 
insignificant  creature  !  My  beloved  Pauline,  you  do  not  your- 
self know  the  power  of  the  look  I  believe  in,  the  look  you 
gave  me  to  tell  me  that  you  had  chosen  me — you  so  young 
and  lovely,  with  the  world  at  your  feet ! 

"  To  enable  you  to  understand  my  happiness,  I  should  have 
to  give  you  a  history  of  my  life.  If  you  had  rejected  me,  all 
was  over  for  me.  I  have  suffered  too  much.  Yes,  my  love 
for  you,  my  comforting  and  stupendous  love,  was  a  last  effort 
of  yearning  for  the  happiness  my  soul  strove  to  reach — a  soul 
crushed  by  fruitless  labor,  consumed  by  fears  that  make  me 
doubt  myself,  eaten  into  by  despair  which  has  often  urged  me 
to  die.  No  one  in  the  world  can  conceive  of  the  terrors  my 
fateful  imagination  inflicts  on  me.  It  often  bears  me  up  to 
the  sky,  and  suddenly  flings  me  to  earth  again  from  prodigious 
heights.  Deep-seated  rushes  of  power,  or  some  rare  and 
subtle  instance  of  peculiar  lucidity,  assure  me  now  and  then 
that  I  am  capable  of  great  things.  Then  I  embrace  the  uni- 
verse in  my  mind,  I  knead,  shape  it,  inform  it,  I  comprehend 
it — or  fancy  that  I  do  ;  then  suddenly  I  awake — alone,  sunk 
in  blackest  night,  helpless  and  weak ;  I  forget  the  light  I  saw 
but  now,  I  find  no  succor ;  above  all,  there  is  no  heart  where 
I  may  take  refuge. 

"  This  distress  of  my  inner  life  affects  my  physical  existence. 
The  nature  of  my  character  gives  me  over  to  the  raptures  of 
happiness  as  defenseless  as  when  the  fearful  light  of  reflection 
comes  to  analyze  and  demolish  them.  Gifted  as  I  am  with 
the  melancholy  faculty  of  seeing  obstacles  and  success  with 
equal  clearness,  according  to  the  mood  of  the  moment,  I  am 
happy  or  miserable  by  turns. 

"Thus,  when  first  I  met  you,  I  felt  the  presence  of  an 
angelic  nature,  I  breathed  an  air  that  was  sweet  to  my  burn- 
16 


242  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

ing  breast,  I  heard  in  my  soul  the  voice  that  never  can  be 
false,  telling  me  that  here  was  happiness ;  but  perceiving  all 
tne  barriers  that  divided  us,  I  understood  for  the  first  time 
what  wordly  prejudices  were ;  I  understood  the  vastness  of 
their  pettiness,  and  these  difficulties  terrified  me  more  than 
the  prospect  of  happiness  could  delight  me.  At  once  I  felt 
the  awful  reaction  which  casts  my  expansive  soul  back  on 
itself;  the  smile  you  had  brought  to  my  lips  suddenly  turned 
to  a  bitter  grimace,  and  I  could  only  strive  to  keep  calm, 
while  my  soul  was  boiling  with  the  turmoil  of  contradictory 
emotions.  In  short,  I  experienced  that  gnawing  pang  to 
which  twenty-three  years  of  suppressed  sighs  and  betrayed 
affections  have  not  inured  me. 

"Well,  Pauline,  the  look  by  which  you  promised  that  I 
should  be  happy  suddenly  warmed  my  vitality,  and  turned  all 
my  sorrows  into  joy.  Now,  I  could  wish  that  I  had  suffered 
more.  My  love  is  suddenly  full-grown.  My  soul  was  a  wide 
territory  that  lacked  the  blessing  of  sunshine,  and  your  eyes 
have  shed  light  on  it.  Beloved  providence  !  you  will  be  all  in 
all  to  me,  orphan  as  I  am,  without  a  relation  but  my  uncle. 
You  will  be  my  whole  family,  as  you  are  my  whole  wealth, 
nay,  the  whole  world  to  me.  Have  you  not  bestowed  on  me 
every  gladness  man  can  desire  in  that  chaste — lavish — timid 
glance  ? 

"You  have  given  me  incredible  self-confidence  and  au- 
dacity. I  can  dare  all  things  now.  I  came  back  to  Blois  in 
deep  dejection.  Five  years  of  study  in  the  heart  of  Paris  had 
made  me  look  on  the  world  as  a  prison.  I  had  conceived  of 
vast  schemes,  and  dared  not  speak  of  them.  Fame  seemed  to 
me  a  prize  for  charlatans,  to  which  a  really  noble  spirit  should 
not  stoop.  Thus,  my  ideas  could  only  make  their  way  by  the 
assistance  of  a  man  bold  enough  to  mount  the  platform  of  the 
press,  and  to  harangue  loudly  the  simpletons  he  scorns.  This 
kind  of  courage  I  have  not.  I  ploughed  my  way  on,  crushed 
by  the  verdict  of  the  crowd,  in  despair  at  never  making  it 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  243 

hear  me.  I  was  at  once  too  humble  and  too  lofty !  I  swal- 
lowed my  thoughts  as  other  men  swallow  humiliations.  I 
had  even  come  to  despise  knowledge,  blaming  it  for  yielding 
no  real  happiness. 

"  But  since  yesterday  I  am  wholly  changed.  For  your  sake 
I  now  covet  every  palm  of  glory,  every  triumph  of  success. 
When  I  lay  my  head  on  your  knees,  I  could  wish  to  attract  to 
you  the  eyes  of  the  whole  world,  just  as  1  long  to  concentrate 
in  my  love  every  idea,  every  power  that  is  in  me.  The  most 
splendid  celebrity  is  a  possession  that  genius  alone  can 
create.  Well,  I  can,  at  my  will,  make  for  you  a  bed  of  laurels. 
And  if  the  silent  ovation  paid  to  science  is  not  all  you  desire, 
I  have  within  me  the  sword  of  the  Word ;  I  could  run  in  the 
path  of  honor  and  ambition  where  others  only  crawl. 

"Command  me,  Pauline;  I  will  be  whatever  you  will. 
My  iron  will  can  do  anything — I  am  loved  !  Armed  with 
that  thought,  ought  not  a  man  to  sweep  everything  before 
him?  The  man  who  wants  all  can  do  all.  If  you  are  the 
prize  of  success,  I  enter  the  lists  to-morrow.  To  win  such  a 
look  as  that  you  bestowed  on  me,  I  would  leap  the  deepest 
abyss.  Through  you  I  understand  the  fabulous  achievements 
of  chivalry  and  the  most  fantastic  tales  of  the  'Arabian 
Nights.'  I  can  believe  now  in  the  most  fantastic  excesses  of 
love,  and  in  the  success  of  a  prisoner's  wildest  attempt  to  re- 
cover his  liberty.  You  have  aroused  the  thousand  virtues  that 
lay  dormant  within  me— patience,  resignation,  all  the  powers 
of  my  heart,  all  the  strength  of  my  soul.  I  live  by  you  and 
—heavenly  thought !— for  you.  Everything  now  has  a  mean- 
ing for  me  in  life.  I  understand  everything,  even  the  vanities 
of  wealth. 

"I  find  myself  shedding  all  the  pearls  of  the  Indies  at  your 
feet ;  I  fancy  you  reclining  either  on  the  rarest  flowers  or  on 
the  softest  tissues,  and  all  the  splendor  of  the  world  seems 
hardly  worthy  of  you,  for  whom  I  would  I  could  command 
the  harmony  and  the  light  that  are  given  out  by  the  harps  of 


244  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

seraphim  and  the  stars  of  heaven  !  Alas !  a  poor,  studious 
poet,  I  offer  you  in  words  treasures  I  cannot  bestow;  I  can 
only  give  you  my  heart,  in  which  you  reign  for  ever.  I  have 
nothing  else.  But  are  there  no  treasures  in  eternal  gratitude, 
in  a  smile  whose  expression  will  perpetually  vary  with  peren- 
nial happiness,  under  the  constant  eagerness  of  my  devotion 
to  guess  the  wishes  of  your  loving  soul  ?  Has  not  one  celestial 
glance  given  us  assurance  of  always  understanding  each  other  ? 

"I  have  a  prayer  now  to  be  said  to  God  every  night — a 
prayer  full  of  you :  '  Let  my  Pauline  be  happy  ! '  And  will 
you  fill  all  my  days  as  you  now  fill  my  heart  ? 

"  Farewell,  I  can  but  trust  you  to  God  alone?" 

in. 

"  Pauline  !  tell  me  if  I  can  in  any  way  have  displeased  you 
yesterday?  Throw  off  the  pride  of  heart  which  inflicts  on  me 
the  secret  tortures  that  can  be  caused  by  one  we  love.  Scold 
me  if  you  will !  Since  yesterday  a  vague,  unutterable  dread 
of  having  offended  you  pours  grief  on  the  life  of  feeling  which 
you  made  so  sweet  and  so  rich.  The  lightest  veil  that  comes 
between  two  souls  sometimes  grows  to  be  a  brazen  wall. 
There  are  no  venial  crimes  in  love  1  If  you  have  the  very 
spirit  of  that  noble  sentiment,  you  must  feel  all  its  pangs,  and 
we  must  be  unceasingly  careful  not  to  fret  each  other  by  some 
heedless  word. 

"  No  doubt,  my  beloved  treasure,  if  there  is  any  fault,  it  is 
in  me.  I  cannot  pride  myself  in  the  belief  that  I  understand 
a  woman's  heart  in  all  the  expansion  of  its  tenderness,  all  the 
grace  of  its  devotedness ;  but  I  will  always  endeavor  to  appre- 
ciate the  value  of  what  you  vouchsafe  to  show  me  of  the 
secrets  of  yours. 

"  Speak  to  me  !  Answer  me  soon  !  The  melancholy  into 
which  we  are  thrown  by  the  idea  of  a  wrong  done  is  frightful ; 
it  casts  a  shroud  over  life  and  doubts  on  everything. 

"  I  spent  this  morning  sitting  on  the  bank  by  the  sunken 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  245 

road,  gazing  at  the  turrets  of  Villenoix,  not  daring  to  go  to 
our  hedge.  If  you  could  imagine  all  I  saw  in  my  soul ! 
What  gloomy  visions  passed  before  me  under  the  gray  sky, 
whose  cold  sheen  added  to  my  dreary  mood  !  I  had  dark 
presentiments  !  I  was  terrified  lest  I  should  fail  to  make  you 
happy. 

"I  must  tell  you  everything,  my  dear  Pauline.  There  are 
moments  when  the  spirit  of  vitality  seems  to  abandon  me. 
I  feel  bereft  of  all  strength.  Everything  is  a  burden  to  me  ; 
every  fibre  of  my  body  is  inert,  every  sense  is  flaccid,  my 
sight  grows  dim,  my  tongue  is  paralyzed,  my  imagination  is 
extinct,  desire  is  dead — nothing  survives  but  my  mere  human 
vitality.  At  such  times,  though  you  were  in  all  the  splendor 
of  your  beauty,  though  you  should  lavish  on  me  your  subtlest 
smiles  and  tenderest  words,  an  evil  influence  would  blind  me 
and  distort  the  most  ravishing  melody  into  discordant  sounds. 
At  those  times — as  I  believe — some  argumentative  demon 
stands  before  me,  showing  me  the  void  beneath  the  most  real 
possessions.  This  pitiless  demon  mows  down  every  flower 
and  mocks  at  the  sweetest  feelings,  saying :  « Well — and  then  ? ' 
He  mars  the  fairest  work  by  showing  me  its  skeleton,  and 
reveals  the  mechanism  of  things  while  hiding  the  beautiful 
results. 

"At  those  terrible  moments,  when  the  evil  spirit  takes 
possession  of  me,  when  the  divine  light  is  darkened  in  my 
soul  without  my  knowing  the  cause,  I  sit  in  grief  and  anguish, 
I  wish  myself  deaf  and  dumb,  I  long  for  death  to  give  me 
rest.  These  hours  of  doubt  and  uneasiness  are  perhaps 
inevitable ;  at  any  rate,  they  teach  me  not  to  be  proud  after 
the  flights  which  have  borne  me  to  the  skies  where  I  have 
gathered  a  full  harvest  of  thoughts ;  for  it  is  always  after  some 
long  excursion  in  the  vast  fields  of  the  intellect,  and  after  the 
most  luminous  speculations,  that  I  tumble,  broken  and  weary, 
into  this  limbo.  At  such  a  moment,  my  angel,  a  wife  would 
doubt  my  love  for  her — at  any  rate,  she  might.  If  she  were 


246  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

capricious,  ailing,  or  depressed,  she  would  need  the  comforting 
overflow  of  ingenuous  affection,  and  I  should  not  have  a  glance 
to  bestow  on  her.  It  is  my  shame,  Pauline,  to  have  to  tell 
you  that  at  such  times  I  could  weep  with  you,  but  that  noth- 
ing could  make  me  smile. 

"  A  woman  can  always  conceal  her  troubles ;  for  her  child, 
or  for  the  man  she  loves,  she  can  laugh  in  the  midst  of  suffer- 
ing. And  could  not  I,  for  you,  Pauline,  imitate  the  exquisite 
reserve  of  a  woman  ?  Since  yesterday  I  have  doubted  my  own 
power.  If  I  could  displease  you  once,  if  I  failed  once  to 
understand  you,  I  dread  lest  I  should  often  be  carried  out  of 
our  happy  circle  by  my  evil  demon.  Supposing  I  were  to 
have  many  of  those  dreadful  moods,  or  that  my  unbounded 
love  could  not  make  up  for  the  dark  hours  of  my  life — that  I 
were  doomed  to  remain  such  as  I  am  ?  Fatal  doubts  ! 

"  Power  is  indeed  a  dreadful  possession  if  what  I  feel  within 
me  is  power.  Pauline,  go  !  Leave  me,  desert  me  !  Sooner 
would  I  endure  every  ill  in  life  then  endure  the  misery  of 
knowing  that  you  were  unhappy  through  me. 

"  But,  perhaps,  the  demon  has  had  such  empire  over  me 
only  because  I  have  had  no  gentle,  white  hands  about  me  to 
drive  him  off.  No  woman  has  ever  shed  on  me  the  balm  of 
her  affection  ;  and  I  know  not  whether,  if  love  should  wave 
his  pinions  over  my  head  in  these  moments  of  exhaustion, 
new  strength  might  not  be  given  to  my  spirit.  This  terrible 
melancholy  is  perhaps  a  result  of  my  isolation,  one  of  the 
torments  of  a  lonely  soul  which  pays  for  its  hidden  treasures 
with  groans  and  unknown  suffering.  Those  who  enjoy  little 
shall  suffer  little ;  immense  happiness  entails  unutterable 
anguish  ! 

"  How  terrible  a  doom  !  If  it  be  so,  must  we  not  shudder 
for  ourselves,  we  who  are  superhumanly  happy  ?  If  nature 
sells  us  everything  at  its  true  value,  into  what  pit  are  we  not 
fated  to  fall  ?  Ah  !  the  most  fortunate  lovers  are  those  who 
die  together  in  the  midst  of  their  youth  and  love  !  How  sad 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  24? 

it  all  is  !  Does  my  soul  foresee  evil  in  the  future  ?  I  examine 
myself,  wondering  whether  there  is  anything  in  me  that  can 
cause  you  a  moment's  anxiety.  I  love  you  too  selfishly 
perhaps  ?  I  shall  be  laying  on  your  beloved  head  a  burden 
heavy  out  of  all  proportion  to  the  joy  my  love  can  bring  to 
your  heart.  If  there  dwells  in  me  some  inexorable  power 
which  I  must  obey — if  I  am  compelled  to  curse  when  you 
pray,  if  some  dark  thought  coerces  me  when  I  would  fain 
kneel  at  your  feet  and  play  as  a  child,  will  you  not  be  jealous 
of  that  wayward  and  tricky  spirit  ? 

"You  understand,  dearest  heart,  that  what  I  dread  is  not 
being  wholly  yours ;  that  I  would  gladly  forego  all  the  sceptres 
and  the  palms  of  the  world  to  enshrine  you  in  one  eternal 
thought,  to  see  a  perfect  life  and  an  exquisite  poem  in  our 
rapturous  love ;  to  throw  my  soul  into  it,  drown  my  powers, 
and  wring  from  each  hour  the  joys  it  has  to  give ! 

"  Ah,  my  memories  of  love  are  crowding  back  upon  me, 
the  clouds  of  despair  will  lift.  Farewell.  I  leave  you  now 
to  be  more  entirely  yours.  My  beloved  soul,  I  look  for  a 
line,  a  word  that  may  restore  my  peace  of  mind.  Let  me 
know  whether  I  really  grieved  my  Pauline,  or  whether  some 
uncertain  expression  of  her  countenance  misled  me.  I  could 
not  bear  to  have  to  reproach  myself  after  a  whole  life  of 
happiness,  for  ever  having  met  you  without  a  smile  of  love,  a 
honeyed  word.  To  grieve  the  woman  I  love — Pauline,  I 
should  count  it  a  crime.  Tell  me  the  truth,  do  not  put  me 
off  with  some  magnanimous  subterfuge,  but  forgive  me  with- 
out cruelty." 

FRAGMENT. 

"  Is  so  perfect  an  attachment  happiness  ?  Yes,  for  years  of 
suffering  would  not  pay  for  an  hour  of  love. 

"  Yesterday,  your  sadness,  as  I  supposed,  passed  into  my 
soul  as  swiftly  as  a  shadow  falls.  Were  you  sad  or  suffering? 
I  was  wretched.  Whence  came  my  distress?  Write  to  me 
at  once.  Why  did  I  not  know  it?  We  are  not  yet  com- 


248  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

pletely  one  in  mind.  At  two  leagues'  distance  or  at  a  thou- 
sand I  ought  to  feel  your  pains  and  sorrows.  I  shall  not 
believe  that  I  love  you  till  my  life  is  so  bound  up  with  yours 
that  our  life  is  one,  till  our  hearts,  our  thoughts  are  one.  I 
must  be  where  you  are,  see  what  you  see,  feel  what  you  feel, 
be  with  you  in  thought.  Did  not  I  know,  at  once,  that  your 
carriage  had  been  overthrown  and  you  were  bruised  ?  But  on 
that  day  I  had  been  with  you,  I  had  never  left  you,  I  could 
see  you.  When  my  uncle  asked  me  what  made  me  turn  so 
pale,  I  answered  at  once,  'Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  has 
had  a  fall.' 

"Why,  then,  yesterday,  did  I  fail  to  read  your  soul?  Did 
you  wish  to  hide  the  cause  of  your  grief?  However,  I  fancied 
I  could  feel  that  you  were  arguing  in  my  favor,  though  in 
vain,  with  that  dreadful  Salomon,  who  freezes  my  blood. 
That  man  is  not  of  our  heaven. 

"Why  do  you  insist  that  our  happiness,  which  has  no  re- 
semblance to  that  of  other  people,  should  conform  to  the  laws 
of  the  world  ?  And  yet  I  delight  too  much  in  your  bashful- 
ness,  your  religion,  your  superstitions,  not  to  obey  your 
lightest  whim.  What  you  do  must  be  right ;  nothing  can  be 
purer  than  your  mind,  as  nothing  is  lovelier  than  your  face, 
which  reflects  your  divine  soul. 

"  I  shall  wait  for  a  letter  before  going  along  the  lanes  to 
meet  the  sweet  hour  you  grant  me.  Oh  !  if  you  could  know 
how  the  sight  of  those  turrets  makes  my  heart  throb  when 
I  see  them  edged  with  light  by  the  moon,  our  only  confi- 
dante." 

rv. 

'•Farewell  to  glory,  farewell  to  the  future,  to  the  life  I  had 
dreamed  of!  Now,  my  well-beloved,  my  glory  is  that  I  am 
yours,  and  worthy  of  you ;  my  future  lies  entirely  in  the  hope 
of  seeing  you ;  and  is  not  my  life  summed  up  in  sitting  at 
your  feet,  in  lying  under  your  eyes,  in  drawing  deep  breaths 
in  the  heaven  you  have  created  for  me  ?  All  my  powers,  all 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  249 

my  thoughts  must  be  yours,  since  you  could  speak  those  thrill- 
ing words :  '  Your  sufferings  must  be  mine  !  '  Should  I  not  be 
stealing  some  joys  from  love,  some  moments  from  happiness, 
some  experiences  from  your  divine  spirit,  if  I  gave  my  hours 
to  study — ideas  to  the  world  and  poems  to  the  poets.  .  Nay, 
nay,  my  very  life,  I  will  treasure  everything  for  you ;  I  will 
bring  to  you  every  flower  of  my  soul.  Is  there  anything  fine 
enough,  splendid  enough,  in  all  the  resources  of  the  world 
or  of  intellect,  to  do  honor  to  a  heart  so  rich,  so  pure  as 
yours — the  heart  to  which  I  dare  now  and  again  to  unite  my 
own?  Yes,  now  and  again,  I  dare  believe  that  I  can  love  as 
much  as  you  do. 

"And  yet,  no  ;  you  are  the  angel- woman  ;  there  will  always 
be  a  greater  charm  in  the  expression  of  your  feelings,  more 
harmony  in  your  voice,  more  grace  in  your  smile,  more  purity 
in  your  looks  than  in  mine.  Let  me  feel  that  you  are  the 
creature  of  a  higher  sphere  than  that  in  which  I  live;  it 
will  be  your  pride  to  have  descended  from  it  j  mine,  that  I 
should  have  deserved  you  ;  and  you  will  not  perhaps  have 
fallen  too  far  by  coming  down  to  me  in  my  poverty  and 
misery.  Nay,  if  a  woman's  most  glorious  refuge  is  in  a  heart 
that  is  wholly  her  own,  you  will  always  reign  supreme  in  mine. 
Not  a  thought,  not  a  deed,  shall  ever  pollute  this  heart,  this 
glorious  sanctuary,  so  long  as  you  vouchsafe  to  dwell  in  it — 
and  will  you  not  live  in  it  for  ever  ?  Did  you  not  enchant 
me  by  the  words,  'Now  and  forever?'  Nunc  et  semper! 
And  I  have  written  these  words  of  our  ritual  below  your  por- 
trait— words  worthy  of  you,  as  they  are  of  God.  He  is  nunc 
et  semper,  as  my  love  is. 

"  Never,  no,  never,  can  I  exhaust  that  which  is  immense, 
infinite,  unbounded — and  such  is  the  feeling  I  have  for  you ; 
I  have  imagined  its  immeasurable  extent,  as  we  measure  space 
by  the  dimensions  of  one  of  its  parts.  I  have  had  ineffable 
joys,  whole  hours  filled  with  delicious  meditation,  as  I  have 
recalled  a  single  gesture  or  the  tone  of  a  word  of  yours.  Thus 


250  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

there  will  be  memories  of  which  the  magnitude  will  overpower 
me,  if  the  reminiscence  of  a  sweet  and  friendly  interview  is 
enough  to  make  me  shed  tears  of  joy,  to  move  and  thrill  my 
soul,  and  to  be  an  inexhaustible  well-spring  of  gladness.  Love 
is  the  life  of  angels ! 

"  I  can  never,  I  believe,  exhaust  my  joy  in  seeing  you.  This 
rapture,  the  least  fervid  of  any,  though  it  never  can  last  long 
enough,  has  made  me  apprehend  the  eternal  contemplation 
in  which  seraphim  and  spirits  abide  in  the  presence  of  God ; 
nothing  can  be  more  natural,  if  from  His  essence  there  ema- 
nates a  light  as  fruitful  of  new  emotions  as  that  of  your  eyes  is, 
of  your  lustrous  brow,  and  your  beautiful  countenance — the 
image  of  your  mind.  Then  the  soul,  our  second  self,  whose 
pure  form  can  never  perish,  makes  our  love  immortal.  I 
would  there  were  some  other  language  than  that  I  use  to  ex- 
press to  you  the  ever-new  ecstasy  of  my  love ;  but  since  there 
is  one  of  our  own  creating,  since  our  looks  are  living  speech, 
must  we  not  meet  face  to  face  to  read  in  each  other's  eyes 
those  questions  and  answers  from  the  heart,  that  are  so  living, 
so  penetrating,  that  one  evening  you  could  say  to  me :  '  Be 
silent ! '  when  I  was  not  speaking.  Do  you  remember  it,  dear 
life? 

"  When  I  am  away  from  you  in  the  darkness  of  absence, 
am  I  not  reduced  to  use  human  words,  too  feeble  to  express 
heavenly  feelings  ?  But  words  at  any  rate  represent  the  marks 
those  feelings  leave  in  my  soul,  just  as  the  word  GOD  imper- 
fectly sums  up  the  notions  we  form  of  that  mysterious  First 
Cause.  But,  in  spite  of  the  subtleties  and  infinite  variety  of 
language,  I  have  no  words  that  can  express  to  you  the  exquisite 
union  by  which  my  life  is  merged  into  yours  whenever  I  think 
of  you. 

"  And  with  what  word  can  I  conclude  when  I  cease  writing 
to  you,  and  yet  do  not  part  from  you  ?  What  can  farewell 
mean,  unless  death  ?  But  is  death  a  farewell  ?  Would  not 
my  spirit  be  then  more  entirely  one  with  yours?  Ah  !  my 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  251 

first  and  last  thought ;  formerly  I  offered  you  my  heart  and 
life  on  my  knees ;  now  what  fresh  blossoms  of  feeling  can  I 
discover  in  my  soul  that  I  have  not  already  given  you  ?  It 
would  be  a  gift  of  a  part  of  what  is  wholly  yours. 

"Are  you  my  future?  How  deeply  I  regret  the  past !  I 
would  I  could  have  back  all  the  years  that  are  ours  no  more, 
and  give  them  to  you  to  reign  over,  as  you  do  over  my  present 
life.  What  indeed  was  that  time  when  I  knew  you  not  ?  It 
would  be  a  void  but  that  I  was  so  wretched." 

FRAGMENT. 

"Beloved  angel,  how  delightful  last  evening  was!  How 
full  of  riches  your  dear  heart  is  !  And  is  your  love  endless, 
like  mine  ?  Each  word  brought  me  fresh  joy,  and  each  look 
made  it  deeper.  The  placid  expression  of  your  countenance 
gave  our  thoughts  a  limitless  horizon.  It  was  all  as  infinite 
as  the  sky,  and  as  bland  as  its  blue.  The  refinement  of  your 
adored  features  repeated  itself  by  some  inexplicable  magic  in 
your  pretty  movements  and  your  least  gestures.  I  knew  that 
you  were  all  graciousness,  all  love,  but  I  did  not  know  how 
variously  graceful  you  could  be.  Everything  combined  to 
urge  me  to  tender  solicitations,  to  make  me  ask  the  first  kiss 
that  a  woman  always  refuses,  no  doubt  that  it  may  be  snatched 
from  her.  You,  dear  soul  of  my  life,  will  never  guess  before- 
hand what  you  may  grant  to  my  love,  and  will  yield,  perhaps, 
without  knowing  it  !  You  are  utterly  true,  and  obey  your 
heart  alone. 

"  The  sweet  tones  of  your  voice  blended  with  the  tender 
harmonies  that  filled  the  quiet  air,  the  cloudless  sky.  Not  a 
bird  piped,  not  a  breeze  whispered — solitude,  you,  and  I. 
The  motionless  leaves  did  not  quiver  in  the  beautiful  sunset 
hues  which  are  both  light  and  shadow.  You  felt  that  heavenly 
poetry — you  who  experienced  so  many  various  emotions,  and 
who  so  often  raised  your  eyes  to  heaven  to  avoid  answering 
me.  You  who  are  proud  and  saucy,  humble  and  masterful, 


252  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

who  give  yourself  to  me  so  completely  in  spirit  and  in  thought, 
and  evade  the  most  bashful  caress.  Dear  witcheries  of  the 
heart !  They  ring  in  my  ears ;  they  sound  and  play  there 
still.  Sweet  words  but  half  spoken,  like  a  child's  speech, 
neither  promise  nor  confession,  but  allowing  love  to  cherish 
its  fairest  hopes  without  fear  or  torment  !  How  pure  a  mem- 
ory for  life  !  What  a  free  blossoming  of  all  the  flowers  that 
spring  from  the  soul,  which  a  mere  trifle  can  blight,  but 
which,  at  that  moment,  everything  warmed  and  expanded. 

"And  it  will  be  always  so,  will  it  not,  my  beloved?  As  I 
recall,  this  morning,  the  fresh  and  living  delights  revealed  to 
me  in  that  hour,  I  am  conscious  of  a  joy  which  makes  me  con- 
ceive of  true  love  as  an  ocean  of  everlasting  and  ever-new 
experiences,  into  which  we  may  plunge  with  increasing  de- 
light. Every  day,  every  word,  every  kiss,  every  glance,  must 
increase  it  by  its  tribute  of  past  happiness.  Hearts  that  are 
large  enough  never  to  forget  must  live  every  moment  in  their 
past  joys  as  much  as  in  those  promised  by  the  future.  This 
was  my  dream  of  old,  and  now  it  is  no  longer  a  dream  ! 
Have  I  not  met  on  this  earth  with  an  angel  who  has  made  me 
know  all  its  happiness,  as  a  reward,  perhaps,  for  having  en- 
dured all  its  torments  ?  Angel  of  heaven,  I  salute  thee  with 
a  kiss. 

"  I  shall  send  you  this  hymn  of  thanksgiving  from  my 
heart,  I  owe  it  to  you ;  but  it  can  hardly  express  my  gratitude 
or  the  morning  worship  my  heart  offers  up  day  by  day  to  her 
who  epitomized  the  whole  gospel  of  the  heart  in  this  divine 

word:  'Believe.'  " 

v. 

"  What !  no  further  difficulties,  dearest  heart !  We  shall 
be  free  to  belong  to  each  other  every  day,  every  hour,  every 
minute,  and  for  ever !  We  may  be  as  happy  for  all  the  days 
of  our  life  as  we  now  are  by  stealth,  at  rare  intervals  !  Our 
pure,  deep  feelings  will  assume  the  expression  of  the  thousand 
fond  acts  I  have  dreamed  of.  For  me  your  little  foot  will  be 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  253 

bared,  you  will  be  wholly  mine  !  Such  happiness  kills  me; 
it  is  too  much  for  me.  My  head  is  too  weak,  it  will  burst 
with  the  vehemence  of  my  ideas.  I  cry  and  I  laugh — I  am 
possessed  !  Every  joy  is  as  an  arrow  of  flame ;  it  pierces  and 
burns  me.  In  fancy  you  rise  before  my  eyes,  ravished  and 
dazzled  by  numberless  and  capricious  images  of  delight.  In 
short,  our  whole  future  life  is  before  me — its  torrents,  its  still 
places,  its  joys ;  it  seethes,  it  flows  on,  it  lies  sleeping ;  then 
again  it  awakens,  fresh  and  young.  I  see  you  and  myself  side 
by  side,  walking  with  equal  pace,  living  in  the  same  thought; 
each  dwelling  in  the  other's  heart,  understanding  and  re- 
sponding to  each  other  as  an  echo  catches  and  repeats  a  sound 
across  wide  space. 

"Can  life  be  long  when  it  is  thus  consumed  hour  by 
hour?  Shall  we  not  die  in  a  first  embrace?  What  if  our 
souls  have  already  met  in  that  sweet  evening  kiss  which  almost 
overpowered  us — a  feeling  kiss,  but  the  crown  of  my  hopes, 
the  ineffectual  expression  of  all  the  prayers  I  breathe  while  we 
are  apart,  hidden  in  my  soul  like  remorse? 

"I,  who  would  creep  back  and  hide  in  the  hedge  only  to 
hear  your  footsteps  as  you  went  homeward — I  may  henceforth 
admire  you  at  my  leisure,  see  you  busy,  moving,  smiling, 
prattling  !  An  endless  joy !  You  cannot  imagine  all  the 
gladness  it  is  to  me  to  see  you  going  and  coming;  only  a 
man  can  know  that  deep  delight.  Your  least  movement  gives 
me  greater  pleasure  than  a  mother  even  can  feel  as  she  sees 
her  child  asleep  or  at  play.  I  love  you  with  every  kind  of 
love  in  one.  The  grace  of  your  least  gesture  is  always  new 
to  me.  I  fancy  I  could  spend  whole  nights  breathing  your 
breath ;  I  would  I  could  steal  into  every  detail  of  your  life, 
be  the  very  substance  of  your  thoughts — be  your  very  self. 

"  Well,  we  shall,  at  any  rate,  never  part  again  !  No  human 
alloy  shall  ever  disturb  our  love,  infinite  in  its  phases  and  as 
pure  as  all  things  are  which  are  One — our  love,  vast  as  the 
sea,  vast  as  the  sky  !  You  are  mine  !  all  mine  !  I  may  look 


254  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

into  the  depths  of  your  eyes  to  read  the  sweet  soul  that  alter- 
nately hides  and  shines  there,  to  anticipate  your  wishes. 

"My  best-beloved,  listen  to  some  things  I  have  never  yet 
dared  to  tell  you,  but  which  I  may  confess  to  you  now.  I 
fek  a  certain  bashfulness  of  soul  which  hindered  the  full  ex- 
pression of  my  feelings,  so  I  strove  to  shroud  them  under  the 
garb  of  thoughts.  But  now  I  long  to  lay  my  heart  bare  before 
you,  to  tell  you  of  the  ardor  of  my  dreams,  to  reveal  the  boil- 
ing demands  of  my  senses,  excited,  no  doubt,  by  the  s.olitude 
in  which  I  have  lived,  perpetually  fired  by  conceptions  of 
happiness,  and  aroused  by  you,  so  fair  in  form,  so  attractive 
in  manner.  How  can  I  express  to  you  my  thirst  for  the  un- 
known rapture  of  possessing  an  adored  wife,  a  rapture  to  which 
the  union  of  two  souls  by  love  must  give  frenzied  intensity. 
Yes,  my  Pauline,  I  have  sat  for  hours  in  a  sort  of  stupor  caused 
by  the  violence  of  my  passionate  yearning,  lost  in  the  dream 
of  a  caress  as  though  in  a  bottomless  abyss.  At  such  moments 
my  whole  vitality,  my  thoughts  and  powers,  are  merged  and 
united  in  what  I  must  call  desire,  for  lack  of  a  word  to  express 
that  nameless  delirium. 

"And  I  may  confess  to  you  now  that  one  day,  when  I 
would  not  take  your  hand  when  you  offered  it  so  sweetly — an 
act  of  melancholy  prudence  that  made  you  doubt  my  love — I 
was  in  one  of  those  fits  of  madness  when  a  man  could  commit 
a  murder  to  possess  a  woman.  Yes,  if  I  had  felt  the  exquisite 
pressure  you  offered  me  as  vividly  as  I  heard  your  voice  in 
my  heart,  I  know  not  to  what  lengths  my  passion  might  not 
have  carried  me.  But  I  can  be  silent,  and  suffer  a  great  deal. 
Why  speak  of  this  anguish  when  my  visions  are  to  become 
realities  ?  It  will  be  in  my  power  now  to  make  life  one  long 
love-making  ! 

"  Dearest  love,  there  is  a  certain  effect  of  light  on  your 
black  hair  which  would  rivet  me  for  hours,  my  eyes  full  of 
tears,  as  I  gazed  at  your  sweet  person,  were  it  not  that  you 
turn  away  and  say :  '  For  shame  ;  you  make  me  quite  shy  !  ' 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  255 

"  To-morrow,  then,  our  love  is  to  be  made  known  !  Oh, 
Pauline  !  the  eyes  of  others,  the  curiosity  of  strangers,  weigh 
on  my  soul.  Let  us  go  to  Villenoix,  and  stay  there  far  from 
every  one.  I  should  like  no  creature  in  human  form  to  in- 
trude into  the  sanctuary  where  you  are  to  be  mine ;  I  could 
even  wish  that,  when  we  are  dead,  it  should  cease  to  exist — 
should  be  destroyed.  Yes ;  I  would  fain  hide  from  all  nature 
a  happiness  which  we  alone  can  understand,  alone  can  feel, 
which  is  so  stupendous  that  I  throw  myself  into  it  only  to  die 
— it  is  a  gulf! 

"  Do  not  be  alarmed  by  the  tears  that  have  wetted  this 
page ;  they  are  tears  of  joy.  My  only  blessing,  we  need 
never  part  again  !  " 

In  1823  I  traveled  from  Paris  to  Touraine  by  diligence. 
At  Mer  we  took  up  a  passenger  for  Blois.  As  the  guard  put 
him  into  that  part  of  the  coach  where  I  had  my  seat,  he  said 
jestingly — 

"You  will  not  be  crowded,  Monsieur  Lefebvre  !  " 

I  was,  in  fact,  alone. 

On  hearing  this  name,  and  seeing  a  white-haired  old  man, 
who  looked  eighty  at  least,  I  naturally  thought  of  Lambert's 
uncle.  After  a  few  ingenious  questions,  I  discovered  that  I 
was  not  mistaken.  The  good  man  had  been  looking  after  his 
vintage  at  Mer,  and  was  returning  to  Blois.  I  then  asked  for 
some  news  of  my  old  "chum."  At  the  first  word,  the  old 
priest's  face,  as  grave  and  stern  already  as  that  of  a  soldier 
who  has  gone  through  many  hardships,  became  more  sad  and 
dark ;  the  lines  on  his  forehead  were  slightly  knit,  he  set  his 
lips,  and  said,  with  a  suspicious  glance — 

"  Then  you  have  never  seen  him  since  you  left  the  Col- 
lege?" 

"  Indeed,  I  have  not,"  said  I.  "  But  we  are  equally  to 
blame  for  our  forgetfulness.  Young  men,  as  you  know,  lead 
such  an  adventurous  and  storm-tossed  life  when  they  leave 


256  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

their  school-forms,  that  it  is  only  by  meeting  that  they  can  be 
sure  of  an  enduring  affection.  However,  a  reminiscence  of 
youth  sometimes  comes  as  a  reminder,  and  it  is  impossible 
to  forget  entirely,  especially  when  two  lads  have  been  such 
friends  as  we  were.  We  went  by  the  name  of  the  Poet-and- 
Pythagoras." 

I  told  him  my  name ;  when  he  heard  it,  the  worthy  man 
grew  gloomier  than  ever. 

''Then  you  have  not  heard  his  story?"  said  he.  "My 
poor  nephew  was  to  be  married  to  the  richest  heiress  in  Blois ; 
but  the  day  before  his  wedding  he  went  mad." 

"  Lambert !  Mad  !  "  cried  I  in  dismay.  "  But  from  what 
cause  ?  He  had  the  finest  memory,  the  most  strongly  consti- 
tuted brain,  the  soundest  judgment,  I  ever  met  with.  Really 
a  great  genius — with  too  great  a  passion  for  mysticism  perhaps ; 
but  the  kindest  heart  in  the  world.  Something  most  extraor- 
dinary must  have  happened  ?  " 

"  I  see  you  knew  him  well,"  said  the  priest. 

From  Mer,  till  we  reached  Blois,  we  talked  only  of  my  poor 
friend,  with  long  digressions,  by  which  I  learned  the  facts  I 
have  already  related  in  the  order  of  their  interest.  I  confessed 
to  his  uncle  the  character  of  our  studies  and  of  his  nephew's 
predominant  ideas ;  then  the  old  man  told  me  of  the  events 
that  had  come  into  Lambert's  life  since  our  parting.  From 
Monsieur  Lefebvre's  account,  Lambert  had  betrayed  symp- 
toms of  madness  before  the  day  of  marriage ;  but  they  were 
such  as  are  common  to  men  who  love  passionately,  and  seemed 
to  me  less  startling  when  I  knew  how  vehement  his  love  had 
been  and  when  I  saw  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix.  In  the 
country,  where  ideas  are  scarce,  a  man  overflowing  with 
original  thought  and  devoted  to  a  system,  as  Louis  was,  might 
well  be  regarded  as  eccentric,  to  say  the  least.  His  language 
would,  no  doubt,  seem  the  stranger  because  he  so  rarely  spoke. 
He  would  say:  "That  man  does  not  dwell  in  my  heaven," 
where  any  one  else  would  have  said :  "  We  are  not  made  on 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  257 

the  same  pattern."  Every  clever  man  has  his  own  quirks  of 
speech.  The  broader  his  genius,  the  more  conspicuous  are 
the  singularities  which  constitute  the  various  degrees  of 
eccentricity.  In  the  country  an  eccentric  man  is  at  once  set 
down  as  half-mad. 

Hence  Monsieur  Lefebvre's  first  sentences  left  me  doubtful 
of  my  school-mate's  insanity.  I  listened  to  the  old  man,  but 
I  criticised  his  statements. 

The  most  serious  symptom  occurred  a  day  or  two  before 
that  fixed  for  the  marriage.  Louis  had  had  some  well-marked 
attacks  of  catalepsy.  He  had  once  remained  motionless  for 
fifty-nine  hours,  his  eyes  staring,  neither  speaking  nor  eating ; 
a  purely  nervous  affection,  to  which  persons  under  the  influ- 
ence of  violent  passion  are  liable ;  a  rare  malady,  but  perfectly 
well  known  to  the  medical  faculty.  What  was  really  extraor- 
dinary was  that  Louis  should  not  have  had  several  previous 
attacks,  since  his  habits  of  rapt  thought  and  the  character  of 
his  mind  would  predispose  him  to  them.  But  his  tempera- 
ment, physical  and  mental,  was  so  admirably  balanced,  that  it 
had,  no  doubt,  been  able  to  resist  the  demands  on  his  strength. 
The  excitement  to  which  he  had  been  wound  up  by  the  antici- 
pation of  acute  physical  enjoyment,  enhanced  by  a  chaste  life 
and  a  highly  strung  soul,  had  no  doubt  led  to  these  attacks, 
of  which  the  results  are  as  little  known  as  the  cause. 

The  letters  that  have  by  chance  escaped  destruction  show 
very  plainly  a  transition  from  pure  idealism  to  the  most 
intense  sensualism. 

Time  was  when  Lambert  and  I  had  admired  his  phenomenon 
of  the  human  mind,  in  which  he  saw  the  fortuitous  separation 
of  our  two  natures,  and  the  signs  of  a  total  removal  of  the 
inner  man,  using  its  unknown  faculties  under  the  operation 
of  an  unknown  cause.  This  disorder,  a  mystery  as  deep  as 
that  of  sleep,  was  connected  with  the  scheme  of  evidence 
which  Lambert  had  set  forth  in  his  "Treatise  on  the  Will." 
And  when  Monsieur  Lefebvre  spoke  to  me  of  Louis'  first 
17 


258  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

attack,  I  suddenly  remembered  a  conversation  we  had  had  on 
the  subject  after  reading  a  medical  book. 

"  Deep  meditation  and  rapt  ecstasy  are  perhaps  the  unde- 
veloped germs  of  catalepsy,"  he  had  said  in  conclusion  of  the 
matter. 

On  the  occasion  when  he  so  concisely  formulated  this  idea, 
he  had  been  trying  to  link  mental  phenomena  together  by  a 
series  of  results,  following  the  processes  of  the  intellect  step 
by  step,  from  their  beginnings  as  those  simple,  purely  animal 
impulses  of  instinct,  which  are  all-sufficient  to  many  human 
beings,  particularly  to  those  men  whose  energies  are  wholly 
spent  in  mere  mechanical  labor  ;  then,  going  on  to  the  aggre- 
gation of  ideas  and  rising  to  comparison,  reflection,  medita- 
tion, and  finally  ecstasy  and  catalepsy.  Lambert,  of  course, 
in  the  artlessness  of  youth,  imagined  that  he  had  laid  down 
the  lines  of  a  great  work  when  he  thus  built  up  a  scale  of  the 
various  degrees  of  man's  mental  powers. 

I  remember  that,  by  one  of  those  chances  which  seem  like 
predestination,  we  got  hold  of  a  great  Martyrology,  in  which 
the  most  curious  narratives  are  given  of  the  total  abeyance  of 
physical  life  which  a  man  can  attain  to  under  the  paroxysms 
of  the  inner  life.  By  reflecting  on  the  effects  of  fanaticism, 
Lambert  was  led  to  believe  that  the  collected  ideas  to  which 
we  give  the  name  of  feelings  may  very  possibly  be  the  material 
outcome  of  some  fluid  which  is  generated  in  all  men,  more  or 
less  abundantly,  according  to  the  way  in  which  their  organs 
absorb,  from  the  medium  in  which  they  live,  the  elementary 
atoms  that  produce  it.  We  went  crazy  over  catalepsy;  and 
with  the  eagerness  that  boys  throw  into  every  pursuit,  we 
endeavored  to  endure  pain  by  thinking  of  something  else. 
We  exhausted  ourselves  by  making  experiments  not  unlike 
those  of  the  epileptic  fanatics  of  the  last  century,  a  religious 
mania  which  will  some  day  be  of  service  to  the  science  of 
humanity.  I  would  stand  on  Lambert's  chest,  remaining 
there  several  minutes  without  giving  him  the  slightest  pain ; 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  259 

but  notwithstanding  these  crazy  attempts,  we  did  not  achieve 
an  attack  of  catalepsy. 

This  digression  seemed  necessary  to  account  for  my  first 
doubts,  which  were,  however,  completely  dispelled  by  Mon- 
sieur Lefebvre. 

"  When  this  attack  had  passed  off,"  said  he,  "  my  nephew 
sank  into  a  state  of  extreme  terror,  a  dejection  that  nothing 
could  overcome.  He'thought  himself  unfit  for  marriage.  I 
watched  him  with  the  care  of  a  mother  for  her  child,  and  found 
him  preparing  to  perform  on  himself  the  operation  to  which 
Origen*  believed  he  owed  his  talents.  I  at  once  carried  him 
off  to  Paris,  and  placed  him  under  the  care  of  Monsieur 
Esquirol.  All  through  our  journey  Louis  sat  sunk  in  almost 
unbroken  torpor,  and  did  not  recognize  me.  The  Paris 
physicians  pronounced  him  incurable,  and  unanimously  ad- 
vised his  being  left  in  perfect  solitude,  with  nothing  to  break 
the  silence  that  was  needful  for  his  very  improbable  recovery, 
and  that  he  should  live  always  in  a  cool  room  with  a  subdued 
light.  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix,  whom  I  had  been  careful 
not  to  apprise  of  Louis'  state,"  he  went  on,  blinking  his  eyes, 
"but  who  was  supposed  to  have  broken  off  the  match,  went 
to  Paris  and  heard  what  the  doctors  had  pronounced.  She 
immediately  begged  to  see  my  nephew,  who  hardly  recognized 
her ;  then,  like  the  noble  soul  she  is,  she  insisted  on  devoting 
herself  to  giving  him  such  care  as  might  tend  to  his  recovery. 
She  would  have  been  obliged  to  do  so  if  he  had  been  her 
husband,  she  said,  and  could  she  do  less  for  him  as  her  lover  ? 
She  removed  Louis  to  Villenoix,  where  they  have  been  living 
for  two  years." 

So,  instead  of  continuing  my  journey,  I  stopped  at  Blois  to 
see  Louis.  Good  Monsieur  Lefebvre  would  not  hear  of  my 
lodging  anywhere  but  at  his  house,  where  he  showed  me  his 
nephew's  room,  with  the  books  and  all  else  that  had  belonged 

*An  early  Christian  Father  (i  86  A. n.)  His  life  was  very  ascetic ;  he 
mutilated  himself  as  he  supposed  is  recommended  in  Matthew  xix.  12. 


260  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

to  him.  At  every  turn  the  old  man  could  not  suppress  some 
mournful  exclamation,  showing  what  hopes  Louis'  precocious 
genius  had  raised,  and  the  terrible  grief  into  which  this  irre- 
parable ruin  had  plunged  him. 

"That  young  fellow  knew  everything,  my  dear  sir  !  "  said 
he,  laying  on  the  table  a  volume  containing  Spinoza's  works. 
"  How  could  so  well  organized  a  brain  go  astray?  " 

"Indeed,  monsieur,"  said  I,  "wasiPnot  perhaps  the  result 
of  its  being  so  highly  organized?  If  he  really  is  a  victim  to 
the  malady  as  yet  unstudied  in  all  its  aspects,  which  is  known 
simply  as  madness,  I  am  inclined  to  attribute  it  to  his  passion. 
His  studies  and  his  mode  of  life  had  strung  his  powers  and 
faculties  to  a  degree  of  energy  beyond  which  the  least  further 
strain  was  too  much  for  nature  ;  Love  was  enough  to  crack 
them,  or  to  raise  them  to  a  new  form  of  expression  which  we 
are  maligning  perhaps,  by  ticketing  it  without  due  knowledge. 
In  fact,  he  may  perhaps  have  regarded  the  joys  of  marriage  as 
an  obstacle  to  the  perfection  of  his  inner  man  and  his  flight 
toward  spiritual  spheres." 

"  My  dear  sir,"  said  the  old  man,  after  listening  to  me  with 
attention,  "  your  reasoning  is,  no  doubt,  very  sound  ;  but  even 
if  I  could  follow  it,  would  this  melancholy  logic  comfort  me 
for  the  loss  of  my  nephew? " 

Lambert's  uncle  was  one  of  those  men  who  live  only  by 
their  affections. 

I  went  to  Villenoix  on  the  following  day.  The  kind  old 
man  accompanied  me  to  the  gates  of  Blois.  When  we  were 
out  on  the  road  to  Villenoix,  he  stopped  me  and  said — 

"As  you  may  suppose,  I  do  not  go  there.  But  do  not  forget 
what  I  have  said  ;  and  in  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix' s  presence 
affect  not  to  perceive  that  Louis  is  mad." 

He  remained  standing  on  the  spot  where  I  left  him,  watch- 
ing me  till  I  was  out  of  sight. 

I  made  my  way  to  the  Castle  of  Villenoix,  not  without  deep 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  261 

agitation.  My  thoughts  were  many  at  each  step  on  this  road, 
which  Louis  had  so  often  trodden  with  a  heart  full  of  hopes, 
a  soul  spurred  on  by  the  myriad  darts  of  love.  The  shrubs, 
the  trees,  the  turns  of  the  winding  road  where  little  gullies 
broke  the  banks  on  each  side,  were  to  me  full  of  strange  in- 
terest. I  tried  to  enter  into  the  impressions  and  thoughts  of 
my  unhappy  friend.  Those  evening  meetings  on  the  edge  of 
the  coombe,  where  his  lady-love  had  been  wont  to  find  him, 
had,  no  doubt,  initiated  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  into  the 
secrets  of  that  vast  and  lofty  spirit,  as  I  had  learned  them  all 
some  years  before. 

But  the  thing  that  most  occupied  my  mind  and  gave  to  my 
pilgrimage  the  interest  of  intense  curiosity,  in  addition  to  the  al- 
most pious  feelings  that  led  me  onward,  was  that  glorious  faith 
of  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix's  which  the  good  priest  had  told 
me  of.  Had  she  in  the  course  of  time  been  infected  with  her 
lover's  madness,  or  had  she  so  completely  entered  into  his  soul 
that  she  could  understand  all  its  thoughts,  even  the  most  per- 
plexed ?  I  lost  myself  in  the  wonderful  problem  of  feeling, 
passing  the  highest  inspirations  of  passion  and  the  most  beau- 
tiful instances  of  self-sacrifice.  That  one  should  die  for  the 
other  is  an  almost  vulgar  form  of  devotion.  To  live  faithful 
to  one  love  is  a  form  of  heroism  that  immortalized  Made- 
moiselle Dupuis.  When  the  great  Napoleon  and  Lord  Byron 
could  find  successors  in  the  hearts  of  women  they  had  loved,  we 
may  well  admire  Bolingbroke's  widow;  but  Mademoiselle  Du- 
puis could  feed  on  the  memories  of  many  years  of  happiness, 
whereas  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix,  having  known  nothing  of 
love  but  its  first  excitement,  seemed  to  me  to  typify  love  in  its 
highest  expression.  If  she  were  herself  almost  crazy,  it  was 
splendid ;  but  if  she  had  understood  and  entered  into  his 
madness,  she  combined  with  the  beauty  of  a  noble  heart  a 
crowning  effort  of  passion  worthy  to  be  studied  and  honored. 

When  I  saw  the  tall  turrets  of  the  castle,  remembering  how 
often  poor  Lambert  must  have  thrilled  at  the  sight  of  them, 


262  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

my  heart  beat  anxiously.  As  I  recalled  the  events  of  our  boy- 
hood, I  was  almost  a  sharer  in  his  present  life  and  situation. 
At  last  I  reached  a  wide,  deserted  courtyard,  and  I  went  into 
the  hall  of  the  house  without  meeting  a  soul.  There  the  sound 
of  my  steps  brought  out  an  old  woman,  to  whom  I  gave  a 
letter  written  to  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  by  Monsieur  Le- 
febvre.  In  a  few  minutes  this  woman  returned  to  bid  me 
enter,  and  led  me  to  a  low  room,  floored  with  black-and-white 
marble ;  the  Venetian  shutters  were  closed,  and  at  the  end  of 
the  room  I  dimly  saw  Louis  Lambert. 

"  Be  seated,  monsieur,"  said  a  gentle  voice  that  went  to  my 
heart. 

Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  was  at  my  side  before  I  was 
aware  of  her  presence,  and  noiselessly  brought  me  a  chair, 
which  at  first  I  would  not  accept.  It  was  so  dark  that  at  first 
I  saw  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  and  Lambert  only  as  two 
black  masses  perceived  against  the  gloomy  background.  I 
presently  sat  down  under  the  influence  of  the  feeling  that 
comes  over  us,  almost  in  spite  of  ourselves,  under  the  ob- 
scure vault  of  a  church.  My  eyes,  full  of  the  bright  sunshine, 
accustomed  themselves  gradually  to  this  artificial  night. 

"  Monsieur  is  your  old  school-friend,"  she  said  to  Louis,  in 
low  tones. 

He  made  no  reply.  At  last  I  could  see  him,  and  it  was  one 
of  those  spectacles  that  are  stamped  on  the  memory  for  ever. 
He  was  standing,  his  elbows  resting  on  the  cornice  of  the  low 
wainscot,  which  threw  his  body  forward,  so  that  it  seemed 
bowed  under  the  weight  of  his  bent  head.  His  hair  was  as 
long  as  a  woman's,  falling  over  his  shoulders  and  hanging 
about  his  face,  giving  him  a  resemblance  to  the  busts  of  the 
great  men  of  the  time  of  Louis  XIV.  His  face  was  perfectly 
white.  He  constantly  rubbed  one  leg  against  the  other,  with 
a  mechanical  action  that  nothing  could  have  checked,  and  the 
incessant  friction  of  the  bones  made  a  doleful  sound.  Near 
him  was  a  bed  of  moss  on  boards. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  263 

"He  very  rarely  lies  down,"  said  Mademoiselle  de  Ville- 
noix;  "  but  whenever  he  does,  he  sleeps  for  several  days." 

Louis  stood,  as  I  beheld  him,  day  and  night  with  a  fixed 
gaze,  never  winking  his  eyelids  as  we  do.  Having  asked 
Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  whether  a  little  more  light  would 
hurt  our  friend,  on  her  reply  I  opened  the  shutters  a  little  way, 
and  could  see  the  expression  of  Lambert's  countenance.  Alas ! 
he  was  wrinkled,  white-headed,  his  eyes  dull  and  lifeless  as 
those  of  the  blind.  His  features  seemed  all  drawn  upward 
to  the  top  of  his  head.  I  made  several  attempts  to  talk  to 
him,  but  he  did  not  hear  me.  He  was  a  wreck  snatched  from 
the  grave,  a  conquest  of  life  from  death — or  of  death  from 
life ! 

I  stayed  for  about  an  hour,  sunk  in  unaccountable  dreams 
and  lost  in  painful  thought.  I  listened  to  Mademoiselle  de 
Villenoix,  who  told  me  every  detail  of  this  life — that  of  a 
child  in  arms. 

Suddenly  Louis  ceased  rubbing  his  legs  together,  and  said 
slowly — 

"The  angels  are  white." 

I  cannot  express  the  effect  produced  upon  me  by  this  ut- 
terance, by  the  sound  of  the  voice  I  had  loved,  whose  accents, 
so  painfully  expected,  had  seemed  to  be  lost  for  ever.  My 
eyes  filled  with  tears  in  spite  of  every  effort.  An  involuntary 
instinct  warned  me,  making  me  doubt  whether  Louis  had 
really  lost  his  reason.  I  was  indeed  well  assured  that  he 
neither  saw  nor  heard  me ;  but  the  sweetness  of  his  tone, 
which  seemed  to  reveal  heavenly  happiness,  gave  his  speech 
an  amazing  effect.  These  words,  the  incomplete  revelation  of 
an  unknown  world,  rang  in  our  souls  like  some  glorious  distant 
bells  in  the  depth  of  a  dark  night.  I  was  no  longer  surprised 
that  Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  considered  Lambert  to  be 
perfectly  sane.  The  life  of  the  soul  had  perhaps  subdued 
that  of  the  body.  His  faithful  companion  had  no  doubt 
— as  I  had  at  that  moment — intuitions  of  that  melodious  and 


264  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

beautiful  existence  to  which  we  give  the  name  of  Heaven  in 
its  highest  meaning. 

This  woman,  this  angel,  was  always  with  him,  seated  at  her 
embroidery  frame;  and  each  time  she  drew  the  needle  out 
she  gazed  at  Lambert  with  sad  and  tender  feeling.  Unable 
to  endure  this  terrible  sight — for  I  could  not,  like  Mademoi- 
selle de  Villenoix,  read  all  his  secrets — I  went  out,  and  she 
came  with  me  to  walk  for  a  few  minutes  and  talk  of  herself 
and  of  Lambert. 

"Louis  must,  no  doubt,  appear  to  be  mad,"  said  she. 
"  But  he  is  not,  if  the  term  mad  ought  only  to  be  used  in 
speaking  of  those  whose  brain  is  for  some  unknown  cause  dis- 
eased, and  who  can  show  no  reason  in  their  actions.  Every- 
thing in  my  husband  is  perfectly  balanced.  Though  he  did 
not  actively  recognize  you,  it  is  not  that  he  did  not  see  you. 
He  has  succeeded  in  detaching  himself  from  his  body,  and 
discerns  us  under  some  other  aspect — what  that  is,  I  know 
not.  When  he  speaks,  he  utters  wondrous  things.  Only  it 
often  happens  that  he  concludes  in  speech  an  idea  that  had  its 
beginning  in  his  mind ;  or  he  may  begin  a  sentence  and  finish 
it  in  thought.  To  other  men  he  seems  insane  ;  to  me,  living 
as  I  do  in  his  mind,  his  ideas  are  quite  lucid.  I  follow  the 
road  his  spirit  travels ;  and  though  I  do  not  know  every  turn- 
ing, I  can  reach  the  goal  with  him. 

"Which  of  us  has  not  often  known  what  it  is  to  think  of 
some  futile  thing  and  be  led  on  to  some  serious  reflection 
through  the  ideas  or  memories  it  brings  in  its  train  ?  Not 
infrequently,  after  speaking  about  some  trifle,  the  simple 
starting-point  of  a  rapid  train  of  reflections,  a  thinker  may 
forget  or  be  silent  as  to  the  abstract  connection  of  ideas  lead- 
ing to  his  conclusion,  and  speak  again  only  to  utter  the  last 
link  in  the  chain  of  his  meditations. 

"  Inferior  minds,  to  whom  this  swift  mental  vision  is  a 
thing  unknown,  who  are  ignorant  of  the  spirit's  inner  work- 
ings, laugh  at  the  dreamer ;  and  if  he  is  subject  to  this  kind 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  265 

of  obliviousness,  regard  him  as  a  madman.  Louis  is  always 
in  this  state ;  he  soars  perpetually  through  the  spaces  of 
thought,  traversing  them  with  the  swiftness  of  a  swallow ;  I 
can  follow  him  in  his  flight.  This  is  the  whole  history  of  his 
madness.  Some  day,  perhaps,  Louis  will  come  back  to  the 
life  in  which  we  vegetate  ;  but  if  he  breathes  the  air  of  heaven 
before  the  time  when  we  may  be  permitted  to  do  so,  why 
should  we  desire  to  have  him  down  among  us?  I  am  content 
to  hear  his  heart  beat,  and  all  my  happiness  is  to  be  with 
him.  Is  he  not  wholly  mine  ?  In  three  years,  twice  at  inter- 
vals he  was  himself  for  a  few  days ;  once  in  Switzerland, 
where  we  went,  and  once  in  an  island  off  the  wilds  of  Brit- 
tany, where  he  took  some  sea-baths.  I  have  twice  been 
very  happy !  I  can  live  on  memory." 

"  But  do  you  write  down  the  things  he  says?  "  I  asked. 

"Why  should  I?"  said  she. 

I  was  silent ;  human  knowledge  was  indeed  as  nothing  in 
this  woman's  eyes. 

"At  those  times,  when  he  talked  a  little,"  she  added,  "  I 
think  I  have  recorded  some  of  his  phrases,  but  I  left  it  off; 
I  did  not  understand  him  then." 

I  asked  her  for  them  by  a  look  ;  she  understood  me.  This 
is  what  I  have  been  able  to  preserve  from  oblivion : 

i. 

Everything  here  on  earth  is  produced  by  an  ethereal  sub- 
stance which  is  the  common  element  of  various  phenomena, 
known  inaccurately  as  electricity,  heat,  light,  the  galvanic 
fluid,  the  magnetic  fluid,  and  so  forth.  The  universal  distri- 
bution of  this  substance,  under  various  forms,  constitutes  what 
is  commonly  known  as  Matter. 

n. 

The  brain  is  the  alembic  to  which  the  Animal  conveys  what 
each  of  its  organizations,  in  proportion  to  the  strength  of  that 


266  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

vessel,  can  absorb  of  that  Substance,  which  returns  it  trans- 
formed into  Will. 

The  Will  is  a  fluid  inherent  in  every  creature  endowed  with 
motion.  Hence  the  innumerable  forms  assumed  by  the 
Animal,  the  results  of  its  combinations  with  that  Substance. 
The  Animal's  instincts  are  the  product  of  the  coercion  of  the 
environment  in  which  it  develops.  Hence  its  variety. 

in. 

In  Man  the  Will  becomes  a  power  peculiar  to  him,  and 
exceeding  in  intensity  that  of  any  other  species. 

IV. 

By  constant  assimilation,  the  Will  depends  on  the  Substance 
it  meets  with  again  and  again  in  all  its  transmutations,  per- 
vading them  by  Thought,  which  is  a  product  peculiar  to  the 
human  Will,  in  combination  with  the  modifications  of  that 

Substance. 

v. 

The  innumerable  forms  assumed  by  Thought  are  the  result 
of  the  greater  or  less  perfection  of  the  human  mechanism. 

VI. 

The  Will  acts  through  organs  commonly  called  the  five 
senses,  which,  in  fact,  are  but  one — the  faculty  of  Sight. 
Feeling  and  tasting,  hearing  and  smelling,  are  Sight  modified 
to  the  transformations  of  the  Substance  which  Man  can  absorb 
in  two  conditions :  untransformed  and  transformed. 

VII. 

Everything  of  which  the  form  comes  within  the  cognizance 
of  the  one  sense  of  Sight  may  be  reduced  to  certain  simple 
bodies  of  which  the  elements  exist  in  the  air,  the  light,  or  in 
the  elements  of  air  and  light.  Sound  is  a  condition  of  the 
air;  colors  are  all  conditions  of  light ;  every  smell  is  a  combi- 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  267 

nation  of  air  and  light ;  hence  the  four  aspects  of  Matter  with 
regard  to  Man — sound,  color,  smell,  and  shape — have  the 
same  origin,  for  the  day  is  not  far  off  when  the  relationship 
of  the  phenomena  of  air  and  light  will  be  made  clear. 

Thought,  which  is  allied  to  Light,  is  expressed  in  words 
which  depend  on  sound.  To  man,  then,  everything  is  derived 
from  the  Substance,  whose  transformations  vary  only  through 
Number — a  certain  quantitative  dissimilarity,  the  proportions 
resulting  in  the  individuals  or  objects  of  what  are  classed  as 
Kingdoms. 

VIII. 

When  the  Substance  is  absorbed  in  sufficient  number  (or 
quantity)  it  makes  of  man  an  immensely  powerful  mechanism, 
in  direct  communication  with  the  very  element  of  the  Sub- 
stance, and  acting  on  organic  nature  in  the  same  way  as  a 
large  stream  when  it  absorbs  the  smaller  brooks.  Volition 
sets  this  force  in  motion  independently  of  the  Mind.  By  its 
concentration  it  acquires  some  of  the  qualities  of  the  Substance, 
such  as  the  swiftness  of  light,  the  penetrating  power  of  elec- 
tricity, and  the  faculty  of  saturating  a  body;  to  which  must 
be  added  that  it  apprehends  what  it  can  do. 

Still,  there  is  in  man  a  primordial  and  overruling  phenomenon 
which  defies  analysis.  Man  may  be  dissected  completely;  the 
elements  of  Will  and  Mind  may  perhaps  be  found ;  but  there 
will  still  remain  beyond  apprehension  the  x  against  which  I 
once  used  to  struggle.  That  .*  is  the  Word,  the  Logos,  whose 
communication  burns  and  consumes  those  who  are  not  pre- 
pared to  receive  it.  The  Word  is  forever  generating  the 
Substance. 

IX. 

Rage,  like  all  our  vehement  demonstrations,  is  a  current  of 
the  human  force  that  acts  electrically ;  its  turmoil  when  liber- 
ated acts  on  persons  who  are  present  even  though  they  be 
neither  its  cause  nor  its  object.  Are  there  not  certain  men 


268  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

who  by  a  discharge  of  Volition  can  sublimate  the  essence  of 
the  feelings  of  the  masses? 

x. 

Fanaticism  and  all  emotions  are  living  forces.  These  forces 
in  some  beings  become  rivers  that  gather  in  and  sweep  away 
everything. 

XI. 

Though  Space  is,  certain  faculties  have  the  power  of  traver- 
sing it  with  such  rapidity  that  it  is  as  though  it  existed  not. 
From  your  own  bed  to  the  frontiers  of  the  universe  there  are 
but  two  steps :  Will  and  Faith. 

XII. 

Facts  are  nothing  j  they  do  not  subsist ;  all  that  lives  of  us 
is  the  Idea. 

XIII. 

The  realm  of  Ideas  is  divided  into  three  spheres:  that  of 
Instinct,  that  of  Abstractions,  that  of  Specialism. 

XIV. 

The  greater  part,  the  weaker  part  of  visible  humanity,  dwells 
in  the  Sphere  of  Instinct.  The  INSTINCTIVES  are  born,  labor, 
and  die  without  rising  to  the  second  degree  of  human  intelli- 
gence, namely,  Abstraction. 

xv. 

Society  begins  in  the  sphere  of  Abstraction.  If  Abstrac- 
tion, as  compared  with  Instinct,  is  an  almost  divine  power,  it 
is  nevertheless  incredibly  weak  as  compared  with  the  gift  of 
Specialism,  which  is  the  formula  of  God.  Abstraction  com- 
prises all  nature  in  a  germ,  more  virtually  than  a  seed  contains 
the  whole  system  of  a  plant  and  its  fruit.  From  Abstraction 
are  derived  laws,  arts,  social  ideas,  and  interests.  It  is  the 
glory  and  the  scourge  of  the  earth :  its  glory  because  it  has 
created  social  life ;  its  scourge  because  it  allows  man  to  evade 
entering  into  Specialism,  which  is  one  of  the  paths  to  the 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  269 

Infinite.  Man  measures  everything  by  Abstractions:  Good 
and  Evil,  Virtue  and  Crime.  Its  formula  of  equity  is  a  pair 
of  scales,  its  justice  is  blind.  God's  justice  sees:  there  is  all 
the  difference. 

There  must  be  intermediate  Beings,  then,  dividing  the 
sphere  of  Instinct  from  the  sphere  of  Abstractions,  in  whom 
the  two  elements  mingle  in  an  infinite  variety  of  proportions. 
Some  have  more  of  one,  some  more  of  the  other.  And  there 
are  also  some  in  which  the  two  powers  neutralize  each  other 
by  equality  of  effect. 

XVI. 

Specialism  consists  in  seeing  the  things  of  the  material 
universe  and  the  things  of  the  spirtual  universe  in  all  their 
ramifications,  original  and  causative.  The  greatest  human 
geniuses  are  those  who  started  from  the  darkness  of  Abstrac- 
tion to  attain  to  the  light  of  Specialism.  (Specialism,  species, 
sight;  speculation,  or  seeing  everything,  and  all  at  once; 
speculum,  a  mirror  or  means  of  apprehending  a  thing  by  seeing 
the  whole  of  it.)  Jesus  had  the  gift  of  Specialism;  He  saw 
each  fact  in  its  root  and  in  its  results,  in  the  past  where  it  had 
its  rise,  and  in  the  future  where  it  would  grow  and  spread ; 
His  sight  pierced  into  the  understanding  of  others.  The  per- 
fection of  the  inner  eye  gives  rise  to  the  gift  of  Specialism. 
Specialism  brings  with  it  Intuition.  Intuition  is  one  of  the 
faculties  of  the  Inner  Man,  of  which  Specialism  is  an  attribute. 
Intuition  acts  by  an  imperceptible  sensation  of  which  he  who 
obeys  it  is  not  conscious :  for  instance,  Napoleon  instinctively 
moving  from  a  spot  struck  immediately  afterward  by  a  cannon 
ball. 

XVII. 

Between  the  sphere  of  Abstraction  and  that  of  Specialism, 
as  between  those  of  Abstraction  and  Instinct,  there  are  beings 
in  whom  the  attributes  of  both  combine  and  produce  a  mix- 
ture ;  these  are  men  of  genius. 


270  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

XVIII. 

Specialism  is  necessarily  the  most  perfect  expression  of  man, 
and  he  is  the  link  binding  the  visible  world  to  the  higher 
worlds ;  he  acts,  sees,  and  feels  by  his  inner  powers.  The 
man  of  Abstraction  thinks.  The  man  of  Instinct  acts. 

XIX. 

Hence  man  has  three  degrees.  That  of  Instinct,  below  the 
average ;  that  of  Abstraction,  the  general  average ;  that  of 
Specialism,  above  the  average.  Specialism  opens  to  man  his 
true  career ;  the  Infinite  dawns  on  him ;  he  sees  what  his 
destiny  must  be. 

xx. 

There  are  three  worlds — the  Natural,  the  Spiritual,  and  the 
Divine.  Humanity  passes  through  the  Natural  world,  which 
is  not  fixed  either  in  its  essence  or  its  faculties.  The  Spiritual 
world  is  fixed  in  its  essence  and  unfixed  in  its  faculties.  The 
Divine  world  is  fixed  in  its  faculties  and  its  essence  both. 
Hence  there  is  necessarily  a  Material  worship,  a  Spiritual 
worship,  and  a  Divine  worship :  three  forms  expressed  in 
action,  speech,  and  prayer,  or,  in  other  words,  in  deed,  appre- 
hension, and  love.  Instinct  demands  deed ;  Abstraction  is 
concerned  with  Ideas ;  Specialism  sees  the  end,  it  aspires  to 
God  with  presentiment  or  contemplation. 

XXI. 

Hence,  perhaps,  some  day  the  converse  of  Et  Verbum  caro 
factum  est  will  become  the  epitome  of  a  new  Gospel,  which 
will  proclaim  that  the  Flesh  shall  be  made  the  Word  and  be- 
come the  Utterance  of  God. 

xxn. 

The  Resurrection  is  the  work  of  the  Wind  of  Heaven 
sweeping  over  the  worlds.  The  angel  borne  on  the  Wind 
does  not  say:  "Arise,  ye  dead;"  he  says,  "Arise,  ye  who 
live !  " 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  271 

Such  are  the  meditations  which  I  have  with  great  difficulty 
cast  in  a  form  adapted  to  our  understanding.  There  are 
some  others  which  Pauline  remembered  more  exactly,  where- 
fore I  know  not,  and  which  I  wrote  from  her  dictation ;  but 
they  drive  the  mind  to  despair  when,  knowing  in  what  an 
intellect  they  originated,  we  strive  to  understand  them.  I 
will  quote  a  few  of  them  to  complete  my  study  of  this  figure ; 
partly,  too,  perhaps,  because,  in  these  last  aphorisms,  Lam- 
bert's formulas  seem  to  include  a  larger  universe  than  the 
former  set,  which  would  apply  only  to  zoological  evolution. 
Still,  there  is  a  relation  between  the  two  fragments,  evident 
to  those  persons — though  they  be  but  few — who  love  to  dive 
into  such  intellectual  deeps : 

I. 

Everything  on  earth  exists  solely  by  motion  and  number. 

n. 

Motion  is,  so  to  speak,  number  in  action. 

in. 

Motion  is  the  product  of  a  force  generated  by  the  Word 
and  by  Resistance,  which  is  Matter.  But  for  Resistance, 
Motion  would  have  had  no  results  ;  its  action  would  have 
been  infinite.  Newton's  gravitation  is  not  a  law,  but  an 
effect  of  the  general  law  of  universal  motion. 

IV. 

Motion,  acting  in  proportion  to  Resistance,  produces  a 
result  which  is  Life.  As  soon  as  one  or  the  other  is  the 
stronger,  Life  ceases. 

v. 

No  portion  of  Motion  is  wasted ;  it  always  produces  num- 
ber; still,  it  can  be  neutralized  by  disproportionate  resistance, 
as  in  minerals. 


272  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

VI. 

Number,  which  produces  variety  of  all  kinds,  also  gives  rise 
to  Harmony,  which,  in  the  highest  meaning  of  the  word,  is 
the  relation  of  parts  to  the  whole. 

VII. 

But  for  Motion,  everything  would  be  one  and  the  same. 
Its  products,  identical  in  their  essence,  differ  only  by  Number, 
which  gives  rise  to  faculties. 

VIII. 

Man  looks  to  faculties ;  angels  look  to  the  Essence. 

IX. 

By  giving  his  body  up  to  elemental  action,  man  can  achieve 
an  inner  union  with  the  Light. 

x. 

Number  is  intellectual  evidence  belonging  to  man  alone; 
by  it  he  acquires  knowledge  of  the  Word. 

XI. 

There  is  a  Number  beyond  which  the  impure  cannot  pass : 
the  Number  which  is  the  limit  of  creation. 

XII. 

The  unit  was  the  starting-point  of  every  product:  com- 
pounds are  derived  from  it,  but  the  end  must  be  identical  with 
the  beginning.  Hence  this  Spiritual  formula :  the  compound 
Unit,  the  variable  Unit,  the  fixed  Unit. 

XIII. 

The  Universe  is  the  Unit  in  variety.  Motion  is  the  means ; 
Number  is  the  result.  The  end  is  the  return  of  all  things  to 
the  Unit,  which  is  God. 


LOUIS  LAMBERT.  273 

XIV. 
Three  and  Seven  are  the  two  chief  Spiritual  numbers. 

xv. 

Three  is  the  formula  of  created  worlds.  It  is  the  Spiritual 
Sign  of  the  creation,  as  it  is  the  Material  Sign  of  dimension. 
In  fact,  God  has  worked  by  curved  lines  only :  the  Straight 
Line  is  an  attribute  of  the  Infinite ;  and  man,  who  has  the  pre- 
sentiment of  the  Infinite,  reproduces  it  in  his  works.  Two  is 
the  number  of  generation.  Three  is  the  number  of  Life  which 
includes  generation  and  offspring.  Add  the  sum  of  four,  and 
you  have  Seven,  the  formula  of  Heaven.  Above  all  is  God ; 
He  is  the  Unit. 

After  going  in  to  see  Louis  once  more,  I  took  leave  of  his 
wife  and  went  home,  lost  in  ideas  so  adverse  to  social  life 
that,  in  spite  of  a  promise  to  return  to  Villenoix,  I  did 
not  go. 

The  sight  of  Louis  had  had  some  mysteriously  sinister  influ- 
ence over  me.  I  was  afraid  to  place  myself  again  in  that 
heavy  atmosphere,  where  ecstasy  was  contagious.  Any  man 
would  have  felt,  as  I  did,  a  longing  to  throw  himself  into  the 
infinite,  just  as  one  soldier  after  another  killed  himself  in  a 
certain  sentry-box  where  one  had  committed  suicide  in  the 
camp  at  Boulogne.  It  is  a  known  fact  that  Napoleon  was 
obliged  to  have  the  hut  burnt  which  had  harbored  an  idea 
that  had  become  a  mortal  infection. 

Louis'  room  had,  perhaps,  the  same  fatal  effect  as  that 
sentry-box. 

These  two  facts  would  then  be  additional  evidence  in  favor 
of  this  theory  of  the  transfusion  of  Will.  I  was  conscious  of 
strange  disturbances,  transcending  the  most  fantastic  results 
of  taking  tea,  coffee,  or  opium,  of  dreams  or  of  fever — mys- 
terious agents,  whose  terrible  action  often  sets  our  brains  on 
fire. 

18 


274  LOUIS  LAMBERT. 

I  ought,  perhaps,  to  have  made  a  separate  book  of  these 
fragments  of  thought,  intelligible  only  to  certain  spirits  who 
have  been  accustomed  to  lean  over  the  edge  of  abysses  in  the 
hope  of  seeing  to  the  bottom.  The  life  of  that  mighty  brain, 
which  split  up  on  every  side  perhaps,  like  a  too  vast  empire, 
would  have  been  set  forth  in  the  narrative  of  this  man's 
visions — a  being  incomplete  for  lack  of  force  or  of  weakness ; 
but  I  preferred  to  give  an  account  of  my  own  impressions 
rather  than  to  compose  a  more  or  less  poetical  romance. 

Louis  Lambert  died  at  the  age  of  twenty-eight,  September 
25,  1824,  in  his  true  love's  arms.  He  was  buried  by  her  de- 
sire in  an  island  in  the  park  at  Villenoix.  His  tombstone  is  a 
plain  stone  cross,  without  name  or  date.  Like  a  flower  that 
has  blossomed  on  the  margin  of  a  precipice,  and  drops  into  it, 
its  colors  and  fragrance  all  unknown,  it  was  fitting  that  he, 
too,  should  fall.  Like  many  another  misprized  soul,  he  had 
often  yearned  to  dive  haughtily  into  the  void,  and  abandon 
there  the  secrets  of  his  own  life. 

Mademoiselle  de  Villenoix  would,  however,  have  been  quite 
justified  in  recording  his  name  on  that  cross  with  her  own. 
Since  her  partner's  death,  reunion  has  been  her  constant, 
hourly  hope.  But  the  vanities  of  woe  are  foreign  to  faithful 
souls. 

Villenoix  is  falling  into  ruin.  She  no  longer  resides  there ; 
to  the  end,  no  doubt,  that  she  may  the  better  picture  herself 
there  as  she  used  to  be.  She  had  said  long  ago — 

"  His  heart  was  mine  ;  his  genius  is  with  God." 

CHATEAU  DE  SACHE,  June-July,  1832. 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL 

(Le  Bal  de  Sceaux). 
To  Henri  de  Balzac,  his  brother  Honort. 

THE  Comte  de  Fontaine,  head  of  one  of  the  oldest  families 
in  Poitou,  had  served  the  Bourbon  cause  with  intelligence 
and  bravery  during  the  war  in  La  Vendee  against  the  Re- 
public. After  having  escaped  all  the  dangers  which  threat- 
ened the  Royalist  leaders  during  this  stormy  period  of  modern 
history,  he  was  wont  to  say  in  jest,  "I  am  one  of  the  men 
who  gave  themselves  to  be  killed  on  the  steps  of  the  throne." 
And  the  pleasantry  had  some  truth  in  it,  being  spoken  by  a 
man  left  for  dead  at  the  bloody  battle  of  Les  Quatre  Chemins. 
Though  ruined  by  confiscation,  the  stanch  Vendeen  steadily 
refused  the  lucrative  posts  offered  him  by  the  Emperor  Napo- 
leon. Immovable  in  his  aristocratic  faith,  he  had  blindly 
obeyed  its  precepts  when  he  thought  it  fitting  to  choose  a 
companion  for  life.  In  spite  of  the  blandishments  of  a  rich 
but  revolutionary  parvenu,  who  valued  the  alliance  at  a  high 
figure,  he  married  Mademoiselle  de  Kergarouet,  without  a 
fortune,  but  belonging  to  one  of  the  oldest  families  in  Brittany. 

When  the  second  revolution  burst  on  Monsieur  de  Fontaine 
he  was  encumbered  with  a  large  family.  Though  it  was  no 
part  of  the  noble  gentleman's  views  to  solicit  favors,  he 
yielded  to  his  wife's  wish,  left  his  country  estate,  of  which  the 
income  barely  sufficed  to  maintain  his  children,  and  came  to 
Paris.  Saddened  by  seeing  the  greediness  of  his  former  com- 
rades in  the  rush  for  places  and  dignities  under  the  new  Con- 
stitution, he  was  about  to  return  to  his  property  when  he 
received  a  ministerial  dispatch,  in  which  a  well-known  mag- 
nate announced  to  him  his  nomination  as  marechal  dc  camp, 

(275) 


276  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

or  brigadier-general,  under  a  rule  which  allowed  the  officers 
of  the  Catholic  armies  to  count  the  twenty  submerged  years  of 
Louis  XVIII. 's  reign  as  years  of  service.  Some  days  later  he 
further  received,  without  any  solicitation,  cx-officio,  the  crosses 
of  the  Legion  of  Honor  and  of  Saint-Louis. 

Shaken  in  his  determination  by  these  successive  favors,  due, 
as  he  supposed,  to  the  monarch's  remembrance,  he  was  no 
longer  satisfied  with  taking  his  family,  as  he  had  piously  done 
every  Sunday,  to  cry  "  Vive  le  Roi "  in  the  hall  of  the  Tuil- 
eries  when  the  royal  family  passed  through  on  their  way  to 
chapel ;  he  craved  the  favor  of  a  private  audience.  The  audi- 
ence, at  once  granted,  was  in  no  sense  private.  The  royal 
drawing-room  was  full  of  old  adherents,  whose  powdered 
heads,  seen  from  above,  suggested  a  carpet  of  snow.  There 
the  count  met  some  old  friends,  who  received  him  somewhat 
coldly;  but  the  princes  he  thought  adorable,  an  enthusiastic 
expression  which  escaped  him  when  the  most  gracious  of  his 
masters,  to  whom  the  count  had  supposed  himself  to  be  known 
only  by  name,  came  to  shake  hands  with  him,  and  spoke  of 
him  as  the  most  thorough  Vendeen  of  them  all.  Notwith- 
standing this  ovation,  none  of  these  august  persons  thought  of 
inquiring  as  to  the  sum  of  his  losses,  or  of  the  money  he  had 
poured  so  generously  into  the  chests  of  the  Catholic  regiments. 
He  discovered,  a  little  late,  that  he  had  made  war  at  his  own 
cost.  Toward  the  end  of  the  evening  he  thought  he  might 
venture  on  a  witty  allusion  to  the  state  of  his  affairs,  similar, 
as  it  was,  to  that  of  many  other  gentlemen.  His  majesty 
laughed  heartily  enough ;  any  speech  that  bore  the  hall-mark 
of  wit  was  certain  to  please  him ;  but  he  nevertheless  replied 
with  one  of  those  royal  pleasantries  whose  sweetness  is  more 
formidable  than  the  anger  of  a  rebuke.  One  of  the  King's 
most  intimate  advisers  took  an  opportunity  of  going  up  to  the 
fortune-seeking  Vendeen,  and  made  him  understand  by  a  keen 
and  polite  hint  that  the  time  had  not  yet  come  for  settling 
accounts  with  the  sovereign ;  that  there  were  bills  of  much 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  277 

longer  standing  than  his  on  the  books,  and  there,  no  doubt, 
they  would  remain,  as  part  of  the  history  of  the  Revolution. 
The  count  prudently  withdrew  from  the  venerable  group, 
which  formed  a  respectful  semicircle  before  the  august  family ; 
then,  having  extricated  his  sword,  not  without  some  difficulty, 
from  among  the  lean  legs  with  which  it  had  become  mixed  up, 
he  crossed  the  courtyard  of  the  Tuileries  and  got  into  the 
hackney  coach  he  had  left  on  the  quay.  With  the  restive 
spirit,  which  is  peculiar  to  the  nobility  of  the  old  school,  in 
whom  still  survives  the  memory  of  the  League  and  the  day 
of  the  Barricades  (in  1588),  he  bewailed  himself  in  his  coach, 
loudly  enough  to  compromise  him,  over  the  change  that  had 
come  over  the  Court.  "Formerly,"  he  said  to  himself, 
"every  one  could  speak  freely  to  the  King  of  his  own  little 
affairs ;  the  nobles  could  ask  him  a  favor,  or  for  money,  when 
it  suited  them,  but  nowadays  one  cannot  recover  the  money 
advanced  for  his  service  without  raising  a  scandal !  By 
heaven  !  the  cross  of  Saint-Louis  and  the  rank  of  brigadier- 
general  will  not  make  good  the  three  hundred  thousand  francs 
I  have  spent,  out  and  out,  on  the  royal  cause.  I  must  speak 
to  the  King,  face  to  face  in  his  own  room." 

This  scene  cooled  Monsieur  de  Fontaine's  ardor  all  the 
more  effectually  because  his  requests  for  an  interview  were 
never  answered.  And,  indeed,  he  saw  the  upstarts  of  the 
Empire  obtaining  some  of  the  offices  reserved,  under  the  old 
monarchy,  for  the  highest  families. 

"  All  is  lost!"  he  exclaimed  one  morning.  "The  King 
has  certainly  never  been  other  than  a  revolutionary.  But 
for  MONSIEUR,  who  never  derogates,  and  is  some  comfort 
to  his  faithful  adherents,  I  do  not  know  into  what  hands 
the  crown  of  France  might  not  fall  if  things  continue  to 
go  on  like  this.  Their  cursed  constitutional  system  is  the 
worst  possible  government,  and  can  never  suit  France.  Louis 
XVIII.  and  Monsieur  Beugnot  spoiled  everything  at  Saint 
Ouen." 


278  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

The  count,  in  despair,  was  preparing  to  retire  to  his  estate, 
abandoning,  with  dignity,  all  claims  to  repayment.     At  this 
moment  the  events  of  the  zoth  March  (1815)  gave  warning  of 
a  fresh  storm,  threatening  to  overwhelm  the  legitimate  mon- 
arch and  his  defenders.     Monsieur  de  Fontaine,  like  one  of 
those  generous  souls  who  do  not  dismiss  a  servant  in  a  torrent 
of  rain,  borrowed  on  his  lands  to  follow  the  routed  monarchy, 
without  knowing  whether  this  complicity  in  emigration  would 
prove  more  propitious  to  him  than  his  past  devotion.     But 
when  he  perceived  that  the  companions  of  the  King's  exile 
were  in  higher  favor  than  the  brave  men  who  had  protested, 
sword  in  hand,  against  the  establishment  of  the  Republic,  he 
may,  perhaps,  have  hoped  to  derive  greater  profit   from  this 
journey  into  a  foreign  land  than  from  active  and  dangerous 
service  in  the  heart  of  his  own  country.     Nor  was  his  courtier- 
like  calculation  one  of  those  rash  speculations  which  promise 
splendid  results  on  paper,  and  are  ruinous  in  effect.     He  was 
— to  quote  the  wittiest  and  most  successful  of  our  diplomatists 
— one  of  the  faithful  five  hundred  who  shared  the  exile  of  the 
Court  at  Ghent,  and  one  of  the  fifty  thousand  who  returned 
with  it.     During  the  short  banishment  of  royalty,  Monsieur 
de   Fontaine   was  so   happy   as   to   be  employed   by  Louis 
XVIII.,  and  found  more  than  one  opportunity  of  giving  him 
proofs  of  great   political    honesty   and   sincere  attachment. 
One  evening,  when  the  King  had  nothing  better  to  do,  he 
recalled  Monsieur  de  Fontaine's  witticism  at  the  Tuileries. 
The  old  Vend6en  did  not  let  such  a  happy  chance  slip ;  he 
told  his  history  with  so  much  vivacity  that  a  king,  who  never 
forgot  anything,  might  remember  it  at  a  convenient  season. 
The  royal  amateur  of  literature  also  observed  the  elegant  style 
given  to  some  notes  which  the  discreet  gentleman  had  been 
invited  to  recast.     This  little  success  stamped  Monsieur  de 
Fontaine  on  the  King's  memory  as  one  of  the  loyal  servants 
of  the  Crown. 
At  the  second  restoration  the  count  was  one  of  those  special 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  27d 

envoys  who  were  sent  throughout  the  departments  charged 
with  absolute  jurisdiction  over  the  leaders  of  revolt ;  but  he 
used  his  terrible  powers  with  moderation.  As  soon  as  this 
temporary  commission  was  ended,  the  high  provost  found  a 
seat  in  the  Privy  Council,  became  a  deputy,  spoke  little, 
listened  much,  and  changed  his  opinions  very  considerably. 
Certain  circumstances,  unknown  to  historians,  brought  him 
into  such  intimate  relations  with  the  sovereign,  that  one  day, 
as  he  came  in,  the  shrewd  monarch  addressed  him  thus:  "My 
friend  Fontaine,  I  shall  take  care  never  to  appoint  you  to  be 
director-general  or  minister.  Neither  you  nor  I,  as  employes, 
could  keep  our  place  on  account  of  our  opinions.  Represen- 
tative government  has  this  advantage :  it  saves  Us  the  trouble 
We  used  to  have,  of  dismissing  Our  secretaries  of  State.  Our 
Council  is  a  perfect  inn-parlor,  whither  public  opinion  some- 
times sends  strange  travelers ;  however,  We  can  always  find  a 
place  for  Our  faithful  adherents." 

This  ironical  speech  was  introductory  to  a  rescript  giving 
Monsieur  de  Fontaine  an  appointment  as  administrator  in  the 
office  of  Crown  lands.  As  a  consequence  of  the  intelligent 
attention  with  which  he  listened  to  his  royal  friend's  sarcasms, 
his  name  always  rose  to  his  majesty's  lips  when  a  commission 
was  to  be  appointed  of  which  the  members  were  to  receive  a 
handsome  salary.  He  had  the  good-sense  to  hold  his  tongue 
about  the  favor  with  which  he  was  honored,  and  knew  how  to 
entertain  the  monarch  in  those  familiar  chats  in  which  Louis 
XVIII.  delighted  as  much  as  in  a  well-written  note,  by  his 
brilliant  manner  of  repeating  political  anecdotes,  and  the 
political  or  parliamentary  tittle-tattle — if  the  expression  may 
pass — which  at  that  time  was  rife.  It  is  well  known  that  he 
was  immensely  amused  by  every  detail  of  his  Gouvcrnemcn- 
tabilitl — a  word  adopted  by  his  facetious  majesty. 

Thanks  to  the  Comte  de  Fontaine's  good-sense,  wit,  and 
tact,  every  member  of  his  numerous  family,  however  young, 
ended,  as  he  jestingly  told  his  sovereign,  in  attaching  himself 


280  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

like  a  silkworm  to  th*  leaves  of  the  pay-list.  Thus,  by  the 
King's  intervention,  his  eldest  son  found  a  high  and  fixed 
position  as  a  lawyer.  The  second,  before  the  Restoration  a 
mere  captain,  was  appointed  to  the  command  of  a  legion  on 
the  return  from  Ghent;  then,  thanks  to  the  confusion  of  1815, 
when  the  regulations  were  evaded,  he  passed  into  the  body- 
guard, returned  to  a  line  regiment,  and  found  himself  after 
the  affair  of  the  Trocaddro  a  lieutenant-general  with  a  com 
mission  in  the  Guards.  The  youngest,  appointed  sub-prefect, 
became  ere  long  a  legal  official  and  director  of  a  municipal 
board  of  the  city  of  Paris,  where  he  was  safe  from  changes  in 
the  Legislature.  These  bounties,  bestowed  without  parade, 
and  as  secret  as  the  favor  enjoyed  by  the  count,  fell  unper- 
ceived.  Though  the  father  and  his  three  sons  each  had  sine- 
cures enough  to  enjoy  an  income  in  salaries  almost  equal  to 
that  of  a  chief  of  department,  their  political  good-fortune 
excited  no  envy.  In  those  early  days  of  the  constitutional 
system,  few  persons  had  very  precise  ideas  of  the  peaceful 
domain  of  the  civil  service,  where  astute  favorites  managed  to 
find  an  equivalent  for  the  demolished  abbeys.  Monsieur  the 
Comte  de  Fontaine,  who  till  lately  boasted  that  he  had  not 
read  the  Charter,  and  displayed  such  indignation  at  the  greed 
of  courtiers,  had,  before  long,  proved  to  his  august  master 
that  he  understood,  as  well  as  the  King  himself,  the  spirit  and 
resources  of  the  representative  system.  At  the  same  time, 
notwithstanding  the  established  careers  open  to  his  three  sons, 
and  the  pecuniary  advantages  derived  from  four  official  appoint- 
ments, Monsieur  de  Fontaine  was  the  head  of  too  large  a 
family  to  be  able  to  reestablish  his  fortune  easily  and  rapidly. 
His  three  sons  were  rich  in  prospects,  in  favor,  and  in 
talent ;  but  he  had  three  daughters,  and  was  afraid  of  wearying 
the  monarch's  benevolence.  It  occurred  to  him  to  mention 
only  one  by  one,  these  virgins  eager  to  light  their  torches. 
The  King  had  too  much  good  taste  to  leave  his  work  incom- 
plete. The  marriage  of  the  eldest  with  a  receiver-general, 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  281 

Planat  de  Baudry,  was  arranged  by  one  of  those  royal  speeches 
which  cost  nothing  and  are  worth  millions.  One  evening, 
when  the  sovereign  was  out  of  spirits,  he  smiled  on  hearing 
of  the  existence  of  another  Demoiselle  de  Fontaine,  for  whom 
he  found  a  husband  in  the  person  of  a  young  magistrate,  of 
inferior  birth,  no  doubt,  but  wealthy,  and  whom  he  created 
baron.  When,  the  year  after,  the  Vendeen  spoke  of  Made- 
moiselle Emilie  de  Fontaine,  the  King  replied  in  his  thin, 
sharp  tones,  "Amicus  Plato  sed  magis  arnica  Natio"  Then, 
a  few  days  later,  he  treated  his  "  friend  Fontaine"  to  a  qua- 
train, harmless  enough,  which  he  styled  an  epigram,  in  which 
he  made  fun  of  these  three  daughters  so  skillfully  introduced, 
under  the  form  of  a  trinity.  Nay,  if  report  is  to  be  believed, 
the  monarch  had  found  the  point  of  the  jest  in  the  unity  of 
the  three  divine  persons. 

"  If  your  majesty  would  only  condescend  to  turn  the  epi- 
gram into  an  epithalamium  ?  "  said  the  count,  trying  to  turn 
the  sally  to  good  account. 

"Though  I  see  the  rhyme  of  it,  I  fail  to  see  the  reason," 
retorted  the  King,  who  did  not  relish  any  pleasantry,  however 
mild,  on  the  subject  of  his  poetry. 

From  that  day  his  intercourse  with  Monsieur  de  Fontaine 
showed  less  amenity.  Kings  enjoy  contradicting  more  than 
people  think.  Like  most  youngest  children,  Emilie  de  Fon- 
taine was  a  Benjamin  spoilt  by  almost  everybody.  The 
King's  coolness,  therefore,  caused  the  count  all  the  more  re- 
gret, because  no  marriage  was  ever  so  difficult  to  arrange  as 
that  of  this  darling  daughter.  To  understand  all  the  obstacles 
we  must  make  our  way  into  the  fine  residence  where  the  official 
was  housed  at  the  expense  of  the  nation.  Emilie  had  spent 
her  childhood  on  the  family  estate,  enjoying  the  abundance 
which  suffices  for  the  joys  of  early  youth ;  her  lightest  wishes 
had  been  law  to  her  sisters,  her  brothers,  her  mother,  and  even 
her  father.  All  her  relations  doted  on  her.  Having  come  to 
years  of  discretion  just  when  her  family  was  loaded  with  the 


282  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

favors  of  tortune,  the  pretty  enchantments  of  life  continued. 
The  luxury  of  Paris  seemed  to  her  just  as  natural  as  a  wealth 
of  flowers  or  fruit,  or  as  the  rural  plenty  which  had  been  the 
joy  of  her  first  years.  Just  as  in  her  childhood  she  had  never 
been  thwarted  in  the  satisfaction  of  her  playful  desires,  so 
now,  at  fourteen,  she  was  still  obeyed  when  she  rushed  into 
the  whirl  of  fashion. 

Thus,  accustomed  by  degrees  to  the  enjoyment  of  money, 
elegance  of  dress,  of  gilded  drawing-rooms  and  fine  carriages, 
they  became  as  necessary  to  her  as  the  compliments  of  flattery, 
sincere  or  false,  and  the  festivities  and  vanities  of  court  life. 
Like  most  spoilt  children,  she  tyrannized  over  those  who  loved 
her,  and  kept  her  blandishments  for  those  who  were  indif- 
ferent. Her  faults  grew  with  her  growth,  and  her  parents 
were  to  gather  the  bitter  fruits  of  this  disastrous  education. 
At  the  age  of  nineteen  Emilie  de  Fontaine  had  not  yet  been 
pleased  to  make  a  choice  from  among  the  many  young  men 
whom  her  father's  politics  brought  to  his  entertainments. 
Though  so  young,  she  asserted  in  society  all  the  freedom  of 
mind  that  a  married  woman  can  enjoy.  Her  beauty  was  so 
remarkable  that,  for  her,  to  appear  in  a  room  was  to  be  its 
queen ;  but,  like  sovereigns,  she  had  no  friends,  though  she 
was  everywhere  the  object  of  attentions  to  which  a  finer  nature 
than  hers  might  perhaps  have  succumbed.  Not  a  man,  not 
even  an  old  man,  had  it  in  him  to  contradict  the  opinions  of 
a  young  girl  whose  lightest  look  could  rekindle  love  in  the 
coldest  heart. 

She  had  been  educated  with  a  care  which  her  sisters  had 
not  enjoyed ;  painted  pretty  well,  spoke  Italian  and  English, 
and  played  the  piano  brilliantly;  her  voice,  trained  by  the 
best  masters,  had  a  ring  in  it  which  made  her  singing  irresist- 
ibly charming.  Clever,  and  intimate  with  every  branch  of 
literature,  she  might  have  made  people  believe  that,  as  Mas- 
carille  says,  people  of  quality  come  into  the  world  knowing 
everything.  She  could  argue  fluently  on  Italian  or  Flemish 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  283 

painting,  on  the  Middle  Ages  or  the  Renaissance ;  pronounced 
at  haphazard  on  books  new  or  old,  and  could  expose  the  de- 
fects of  a  work  with  a  cruelly  graceful  wit.  The  simplest 
thing  she  said  was  accepted  by  an  admiring  crowd  as  zfetfah  of 
the  Sultan  by  the  Turks.  She  thus  dazzled  shallow  persons ; 
as  to  deeper  minds,  her  natural  tact  enabled  her  to  discern 
them,  and  for  them  she  put  forth  so  much  fascination  that, 
under  cover  of  her  charms,  she  escaped  their  scrutiny.  This 
enchanting  veneer  covered  a  careless  heart ;  the  opinion — 
common  to  many  young  girls — that  no  one  else  dwelt  in  a 
sphere  so  lofty  as  to  be  able  to  understand  the  merits  of  her 
soul ;  and  a  pride  based  no  less  on  her  birth  than  on  her 
beauty.  In  the  absence  of  the  overwhelming  sentiment 
which,  sooner  or  later,  works  havoc  in  a  woman's  heart,  she 
spent  her  young  ardor  in  an  immoderate  love  of  distinctions, 
and  expressed  the  deepest  contempt  for  persons  of  inferior 
birth.  Supremely  impertinent  to  all  newly  created  nobility, 
she  made  every  effort  to  get  her  parents  recognized  as  equals 
by  the  most  illustrious  families  of  the  Saint-Germain  quarter. 
These  sentiments  had  not  escaped  the  observing  eye  of 
Monsieur  de  Fontaine,  who  more  than  once,  when  his  two 
elder  girls  were  married,  had  smarted  under  Emilie's  sarcasm. 
Logical  readers  will  be  surprised  to  see  the  old  Royalist  be- 
stowing his  eldest  daughter  on  a  receiver-general,  possessed, 
indeed,  of  some  old  hereditary  estates,  but  whose  name  was 
not  preceded  by  the  little  word  to  which  the  throne  owed  so 
many  partisans,  and  his  second  to  a  magistrate  too  lately 
baronified  to  obscure  the  fact  that  his  father  had  sold  fire- 
wood. This  noteworthy  change  in  the  ideas  of  a  noble  on 
the  verge  of  his  sixtieth  year — an  age  when  men  rarely  re- 
nounce their  convictions — was  due  not  merely  to  his  unfortu- 
nate residence  in  the  modern  Babylon,  where,  sooner  or  later, 
country  folk  all  get  their  corners  rubbed  down ;  the  Comte 
de  Fontaine's  new  political  conscience  was  also  a  result  of  the 
King's  advice  and  friendship.  The  philosophical  prince  had 


284  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

taken  pleasure  in  converting  the  Vendeen  to  the  ideas  required 
by  the  advance  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  the  new  aspect 
of  the  Monarchy.  Louis  XVIII.  aimed  at  fusing  parties  as 
Napoleon  had  fused  things  and  men.  The  legitimate  King, 
who  was  not  less  clever  perhaps  than  his  rival,  acted  in  a 
contrary  direction.  The  last  head  of  the  House  of  Bourbon 
was  just  as  eager  to  satisfy  the  third  estate  and  the  creations 
of  the  Empire,  by  curbing  the  clergy,  as  the  first  of  the  Napo- 
leons had  been  to  attract  the  grand  old  nobility,  or  to  endow 
the  church.  The  privy  councilor,  being  in  the  secret  of  these 
royal  projects,  had  insensibly  become  one  of  the  most  prudent 
and  influential  leaders  of  that  moderate  party  which  most  de- 
sired a  fusion  of  opinion  in  the  interests  of  the  nation.  He 
preached  the  expensive  doctrines  of  constitutional  govern- 
ment, and  lent  all  his  weight  to  encourage  the  political  see- 
saw which  enabled  his  master  to  rule  France  in  the  midst  of 
storms.  Perhaps  Monsieur  de  Fontaine  hoped  that  one  of 
the  sudden  gusts  of  legislation,  whose  unexpected  efforts  then 
startled  the  oldest  politicians,  might  carry  him  up  to  the  rank 
of  peer.  One  of  his  most  rigid  principles  was  to  recognize 
no  nobility  in  France  but  that  of  the  peerage — the  only  fami- 
lies that  might  enjoy  any  privileges. 

"  A  nobility  bereft  of  privileges,"  he  would  say,  "  is  a  tool 
without  a  handle." 

As  far  from  Lafayette's  party  as  he  was  from  La  Bourdon- 
naye's,  he  ardently  engaged  in  the  task  of  general  reconcilia- 
tion, which  was  to  result  in  a  new  era  and  splendid  fortunes  for 
France.  He  strove  to  convince  the  families  who  frequented 
his  drawing-room,  or  those  whom  he  visited,  how  few  favor- 
able openings  would  henceforth  *be  offered  by  a  civil  or  mili- 
tary career.  He  urged  mothers  to  give  their  boys  a  start  in 
independent  and  industrial  professions,  explaining  that  mili- 
tary posts  and  high  Government  appointments  must  at  last 
pertain,  in  a  quite  constitutional  order,  to  the  younger  sons 
of  members  of  the  peerage.  According  to  him,  the  people 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  285 

had  conquered  a  sufficiently  large  share  in  practical  govern- 
ment by  its  elective  assembly,  its  appointments  to  law-offices, 
and  those  of  the  exchequer,  which,  said  he,  would  always,  as 
heretofore,  be  the  natural  right  of  the  distinguished  men  of 
the  third  estate. 

These  new  notions  of  the  head  of  the  Fontaines,  and  the 
prudent  matches  for  his  eldest  girls  to  which  they  had  led,  met 
with  strong  resistance  in  the  bosom  of  his  family.  The  Com- 
tesse  de  Fontaine  remained  faithful  to  the  ancient  beliefs  which 
no  woman  could  disown,  who,  through  her  mother,  belonged 
to  the  Rohans.  Although  she  had  for  a  while  opposed  the 
happiness  and  fortune  awaiting  her  two  eldest  girls,  she  yielded 
to  those  private  considerations  which  husband  and  wife  con- 
fide to  each  other  when  their  heads  are  resting  on  the  same 
pillow.  Monsieur  de  Fontaine  calmly  pointed  out  to  his  wife, 
by  exact  arithmetic,  that  their  residence  in  Paris,  the  necessity 
for  entertaining,  the  magnificence  of  the  house  which  made  up 
to  them  now  for  the  privations  so  bravely  shared  in  La  Vendee, 
and  the  expenses  of  their  sons,  swallowed  up  the  chief  part  of 
their  income  from  salaries.  They  must  therefore  seize,  as  a 
boon  from  heaven,  the  opportunities  which  offered  for  settling 
their  girls  with  such  wealth.  Would  they  not  some  day  enjoy 
sixty — eighty — a  hundred  thousand  francs  a  year?  Such  ad- 
vantageous matches  were  not  to  be  met  with  every  day  for  girls 
without  a  portion.  Again,  it  was  time  that  they  should  begin 
to  think  of  economizing,  to  add  to  the  estate  of  Fontaine,  and 
reestablish  the  old  territorial  fortune  of  the  family.  The  com- 
tesse  yielded  to  such  cogent  arguments,  as  every  mother  would 
have  done  in  her  place,  though  perhaps  with  a  better  grace ; 
but  she  declared  that  Emilie,  at  any  rate,  should  marry  in  such 
a  way  as  to  satisfy  the  pride  she  had  unfortunately  contributed 
to  foster  in  the  girl's  young  soul. 

Thus  events,  which  ought  to  have  brought  joy  into  the 
family,  had  introduced  a  small  leaven  of  discord.  The  re- 
ceiver-general and  the  young  lawyer  were  the  objects  of  a 


286  THE  SCEAUX  BALL, 

ceremonious  formality  which  the  comtesse  and  Emilie  con- 
trived to  create.  This  etiquette  soon  found  even  ampler  op- 
portunity for  the  display  of  domestic  tyranny ;  for  Lieutenant- 
General  de  Fontaine  married  Mademoiselle  Mongenod,  the 
daughter  of  a  rich  banker ;  the  president  very  sensibly  found 
a  wife  in  a  young  lady  whose  father,  twice  or  thrice  a  mil- 
lionaire, had  traded  in  salt ;  and  the  third  brother,  faithful  to 
his  plebeian  doctrines,  married  Mademoiselle  Grossetdte,  the 
only  daughter  of  the  receiver-general  at  Bourges.  The  three 
sisters-in-law  and  the  two  brothers-in-law  found  the  high  sphere 
of  political  bigwigs,  and  the  drawing-rooms  of  the  Faubourg 
Saint-Germain,  so  full  of  charm  and  of  personal  advantages, 
that  they  united  in  forming  a  little  court  round  the  overbear- 
ing Emilie.  This  treaty  between  interest  and  pride  was  not, 
however,  so  firmly  cemented  but  that  the  young  despot  was, 
not  infrequently,  the  cause  of  revolts  in  her  little  realm. 
Scenes,  which  the  highest  circles  would  not  have  disowned, 
kept  up  a  sarcastic  temper  among  all  the  members  of  this 
powerful  family ;  and  this,  without  seriously  diminishing  the 
regard  they  professed  in  public,  degenerated  sometimes  in 
private  into  sentiments  far  from  charitable.  Thus  the  lieu- 
tenant-general's wife,  having  become  a  baronne,  thought  her- 
self quite  as  noble  as  a  Kergarouet,  and  imagined  that  her 
good  hundred  thousand  francs  a  year  gave  her  the  right  to  be 
as  impertinent  as  her  sister-in-law  Emilie,  whom  she  would 
sometimes  wish  to  see  happily  married,  as  she  announced  that 
the  daughter  of  some  peer  of  France  had  married  Monsieur 
So-and-so  with  no  title  to  his  name.  The  Vicomtesse  de 
Fontaine  amused  herself  by  eclipsing  Emilie  in  the  taste  and 
magnificence  that  were  conspicuous  in  her  dress,  her  furniture, 
and  her  carriages.  The  satirical  spirit  in  which  her  brothers 
and  sisters  sometimes  received  the  claims  avowed  by  Made- 
moiselle de  Fontaine  roused  her  to  wrath  that  a  perfect  hail- 
storm of  sharp  sayings  could  hardly  mitigate.  So  when  the 
head  of  the  family  felt  a  slight  chill  in  the  King's  tacit  and 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  287 

precarious  friendship,  he  trembled  all  the  more  because,  as  a 
result  of  her  sisters'  defiant  mockery,  his  favorite  daughter  had 
never  before  looked  so  high. 

In  the  midst  of  these  circumstances,  and  at  a  moment  when 
this  petty  domestic  warfare  had  become  serious,  the  monarch, 
whose  favor  Monsieur  de  Fontaine  still  hoped  to  regain,  was 
attacked  by  the  malady  of  which  he  was  to  die.  The  great 
political  chief,  who  knew  so  well  how  to  steer  his  bark  in  the 
midst  of  tempests,  soon  succumbed.  Certain  then  of  favors 
to  come,  the  Comte  de  Fontaine  made  every  effort  to  collect 
the  elite  of  marrying  men  about  his  youngest  daughter.  Those 
who  may  have  tried  to  solve  the  difficult  problem  of  settling  a 
haughty  and  capricious  girl  will  understand  the  trouble  taken 
by  the  unlucky  father.  Such  an  affair,  carried  out  to  the 
liking  of  his  beloved  child,  would  worthily  crown  the  career 
the  count  had  followed  for  these  ten  years  at  Paris.  From 
the  way  in  which  his  family  claimed  salaries  under  every  de- 
partment, it  might  be  compared  with  the  House  of  Austria, 
which,  by  intermarriage,  threatens  to  pervade  Europe.  The 
old  Vendeen  was  not  to  be  discouraged  in  bringing  forward 
suitors,  so  much  had  he  his  daughter's  happiness  at  heart,  but 
nothing  could  be  more  absurd  than  the  way  in  which  the  im- 
pertinent young  thing  pronounced  her  verdicts  and  judged  the 
merits  of  her  adorers.  It  might  have  been  supposed  that,  like 
a  princess  in  the  "Arabian  Nights,"  Emilie  was  rich  enough 
and  beautiful  enough  to  choose  from  among  all  the  princes  in  the 
world.  Her  objections  were  each  more  preposterous  than  the 
last :  one  had  too  thick  knees  and  was  bow-legged,  another  was 
short-sighted,  this  one's  name  was  Durand,  that  one  limped, 
and  almost  all  were  too  fat.  Livelier,  more  attractive,  and 
gayer  than  ever  after  dismissing  two  or  three  suitors,  she  rushed 
into  the  festivities  of  the  winter  season,  and  to  balls,  where  her 
keen  eyes  criticised  the  celebrities  of  the  day,  delighting  in 
encouraging  proposals  which  she  invariably  rejected. 

Nature  had  bestowed  on  her  all  the  advantages  needed  for 


288  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

playing  the  part  of  Celimene.  Tall  and  slight,  Emilie  de 
Fontaine  could  assume  a  dignified  or  a  frolicsome  mien  at 
her  will.  Her  neck  was  rather  long,  allowing  her  to  affect 
beautiful  attitudes  of  scorn  and  impertinence.  She  had  culti- 
vated a  large  variety  of  those  turns  of  the  head  and  feminine 
gestures,  which  emphasize  so  cruelly  or  so  happily  a  hint  or  a 
smile.  Fine  black  hair,  thick  and  strongly  arched  eyebrows, 
lent  her  countenance  an  expression  of  pride  to  which  her 
coquettish  instincts  and  her  mirror  had  taught  her  to  add 
terror  by  a  stare,  or  gentleness  by  the  softness  of  her  gaze,  by 
the  set  or  the  gracious  curve  of  her  lips,  by  the  coldness  or  the 
sweetness  of  her  smile.  When  Emilie  meant  to  conquer  a 
heart,  her  pure  voice  did  not  lack  melody ;  but  she  could  also 
give  it  a  sort  of  curt  clearness  when  she  was  minded  to  para- 
lyze a  partner's  indiscreet  tongue.  Her  colorless  face  and 
alabaster  brow  were  like  the  limpid  surface  of  a  lake,  which  by 
turns  is  rippled  by  the  impulse  of  a  breeze  and  recovers  its 
glad  serenity  when  the  air  is  still.  More  than  one  young  man, 
a  victim  to  her  scorn,  accused  her  of  acting  a  part ;  but  she 
justified  herself  by  inspiring  her  detractors  with  the  desire  to 
please  her,  and  then  subjecting  them  to  all  her  most  con- 
temptuous caprice.  Among  the  young  girls  of  fashion,  not 
one  knew  better  than  she  how  to  assume  an  air  of  reserve  when 
a  man  of  talent  was  introduced  to  her,  or  how  to  display  the 
insulting  politeness  which  treats  an  equal  as  an  inferior,  and 
to  pour  out  her  impertinence  on  all  who  tried  to  hold  their 
heads  on  a  level  with  hers.  Wherever  she  went  she  seemed 
to  be  accepting  homage  rather  than  compliments,  and  even  in 
a  princess  her  airs  and  manner  would  have  transformed  the 
chair  on  which  she  sat  into  an  imperial  throne. 

Monsieur  de  Fontaine  discovered  too  late  how  utterly  the 
education  of  the  daughter  he  loved  had  been  ruined  by  the 
tender  devotion  of  the  whole  family.  The  admiration  which 
the  world  is  at  first  ready  to  bestow  on  a  young  girl,  but  for 
which,  sooner  or  later,  it  takes  its  revenge,  had  added  to 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  289 

Emilie's  pride,  and  increased  her  self-confidence.     Universal 
subservience  had  developed  in  her  the  selfishness  natural  to 
spoilt  children,  who,  like  kings,  make  a  plaything  of  every- 
thing that  comes  to  hand.     As  yet  the  graces  of  youth  and 
the  charms  of  talent  hid  these  faults  from  every  eye ;  faults  all 
the  more  odious  in  a  woman,  since  she  can  only  please  by 
self-sacrifice  and  unselfishness;  but  nothing  escapes  the  eye  of 
a  good  father,  and  Monsieur  de  Fontaine  often  tried  to  explain 
to  his  daughter  the  more  important  pages  of  the  mysterious 
book  of  life.     Vain  effort !     He  had  to  lament  his  daughter's 
capricious  indocility  and    ironical    shrewdness   too  often   to 
persevere  in  a  task  so  difficult   as  that  of  correcting  an  ill- 
disposed  nature.     He  contented  himself  with  giving  her  from 
time  to  time  some  gentle  and  kind  advice ;  but  he  had  the 
sorrow  of  seeing  his  tenderest  words  slide  from  his  daughter's 
heart  as  if  it  were  of  marble.     A  father's  eyes  are  slow  to  be 
unsealed,  and  it  needed  more  than  one  experience  before  the 
old  Royalist  perceived  that  his  daughter's  rare  caresses  were 
bestowed  on  him  with  an  air  of  condescension.     She  was  like 
young  children,  who  seem  to  say  to  their  mother:    "Make 
haste  to  kiss  me,  that  I  may  go  to  play."     In  short,  Emilie 
vouchsafed  to  be  fond  of  her  parents.     But  often,  by  those 
sudden  whims,  which  seem  inexplicable  in  young  girls,  she 
kept  aloof  and  scarcely  ever   appeared ;    she  complained  of 
having  to  share  her  father's  and  mother's  heart  with  too  many 
people ;  she  was  jealous  of  every  one,  even  of  her  brothers  and 
sisters.     Then,  after  creating  a  desert  about  her,  the  strange 
girl  accused  all  nature  of  her  unreal  solitude  and  her  willful 
griefs.     Strong  in   the  experience  of  her  twenty  years,   she 
blamed  fate,  because,  not  knowing  that   the  mainspring  of 
happiness  is  in  ourselves,  she  demanded  it  of  the  circumstances 
of  life.     She  would  have  fled  to  the  ends  of  the  earth  to  escape 
a  marriage  such  as  those  of  her  two  sisters,  and  nevertheless 
her  heart  was  full  of  horrible  jealousy  at  seeing  them  married, 
rich,  and  happy.     In  short,  she  sometimes  led  her  mother — 
19 


290  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

who  was  as  much  a  victim  to  her  vagaries  as  Monsieur  de 
Fontaine — to  suspect  that  she  had  a  touch  of  madness. 

But  such  aberrations  are  quite  explicable ;  nothing  is  com- 
moner than  this  unconfessed  pride  developed  in  the  heart  of 
young  girls  belonging  to  families  high  in  the  social  scale,  and 
gifted  by  nature  with  great  beauty.  They  are  almost  all  con- 
vinced that  their  mothers,  now  forty  or  fifty  years  of  age,  can 
neither  sympathize  with  their  young  souls  nor  conceive  of 
their  imaginings.  They  fancy  that  most  mothers,  jealous  of 
their  girls,  want  to  dress  them  in  their  own  way  with  the  pre- 
meditated purpose  of  eclipsing  them  or  robbing  them  of 
admiration.  Hence,  often,  secret  tears  and  dumb  revolt 
against  supposed  tyranny.  In  the  midst  of  these  woes,  which 
become  very  real  though  built  on  an  imaginary  basis,  they 
have  also  a  mania  for  composing  a  scheme  of  life,  while  cast- 
ing for  themselves  a  brilliant  horoscope ;  their  magic  consists 
in  taking  their  dreams  for  reality ;  secretly,  in  their  long 
meditations,  they  resolve  to  give  their  heart  and  hand  to  none 
but  a  man  possessing  this  or  the  other  qualification ;  and  they 
paint  in  fancy  a  model  to  which,  whether  or  not,  the  future 
lover  must  correspond.  After  some  little  experience  of  life, 
and  the  serious  reflections  that  come  with  years,  by  dint  of 
seeing  the  world  and  its  prosaic  round,  by  dint  of  observing 
unhappy  examples,  the  brilliant  hues  of  their  ideal  are  extin- 
guished. Then,  one  fine  day,  in  the  course  of  events,  they 
are  quite  astonished  to  find  themselves  happy  without  the 
nuptial  poetry  of  their  day-dreams.  It  was  on  the  strength 
of  that  poetry  that  Mademoiselle  Emilie  de  Fontaine,  in  her 
slender  wisdom,  had  drawn  up  a  programme  to  which  a  suitor 
must  conform  to  be  accepted.  Hence  her  disdain  and 
sarcasm. 

"Though  young  and  of  an  ancient  family,  he  must  be  a 
peer  of  France,"  said  she  to  herself.  "  I  could  not  bear  not 
to  see  my  coat-of-arms  on  the  panels  of  my  carriage  among 
the  folds  of  azure  mantling,  not  to  drive  like  the  princes  down 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  291 

the  broad  walk  of  the  Champs  Elysees  on  the  days  of  Long- 
champs  in  holy  week.  Beside,  my  father  says  that  it  will 
some  day  be  the  highest  dignity  in  France.  He  must  be  a 
soldier — but  I  reserve  the  right  of  making  him  retire;  and 
he  must  bear  an  Order,  that  the  sentries  may  present  arms 
to  us." 

And  these  rare  qualifications  would  count  for  nothing  if 
this  creature  of  fancy  had  not  a  most  amiable  temper,  a  fine 
figure,  intelligence,  and,  above  all,  if  he  were  not  slender. 
To  be  lean,  a  personal  grace  which  is  but  fugitive,  especially 
under  a  representative  government,  was  an  indispensable  con- 
dition. Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  had  an  ideal  standard 
which  was  to  be  the  model.  A  young  man  who  at  the  first 
glance  did  not  fulfill  the  requisite  conditions  did  not  even  get 
a  second  look. 

"Good  heavens!  see  how  fat  he  is!"  was  with  her  the 
utmost  expression  of  contempt. 

To  hear  her,  people  of  respectable  corpulence  were  inca- 
pable of  sentiment,  bad  husbands,  and  unfit  for  civilized 
society.  Though  it  is  esteemed  a  beauty  in  the  East,  to  be 
fat  seemed  to  her  a  misfortune  for  a  woman  ;  but  in  a  man  it 
was  a  crime.  These  paradoxical  views  were  amusing,  thanks 
to  a  certain  liveliness  of  rhetoric.  The  count  felt  nevertheless 
that  by-and-by  his  daughter's  affectations,  of  which  the  ab- 
surdity would  be  evident  to  some  women  who  were  not  less 
clear-sighted  than  merciless,  would  inevitably  become  a  sub- 
ject of  constant  ridicule.  He  feared  lest  her  eccentric  notions 
should  deviate  into  bad  style.  He  trembled  to  think  that  the 
pitiless  world  might  already  be  laughing  at  a  young  woman 
who  remained  so  long  on  the  stage  without  arriving  at  any 
conclusion  of  the  drama  she  was  playing.  More  than  one 
actor  in  it,  disgusted  by  a  refusal,  seemed  to  be  waiting  for 
the  slightest  turn  of  ill-luck  to  take  his  revenge.  The  indif- 
ferent, the  lookers-on  were  beginning  to  weary  of  it ;  admira- 
tion is  always  exhausting  to  human  beings.  The  old  Vendeen 


292  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

knew  better  than  any  one  that  if  there  is  an  art  in  choosing 
the  right  moment  for  coming  forward  on  the  boards  of  the 
world,  on  those  of  the  Court,  in  a  drawing-room  or  on  the 
stage,  it  is  still  more  difficult  to  quit  them  in  the  nick  of  time. 
So  during  the  first  winter  after  the  accession  of  Charles  X., 
he  redoubled  his  efforts,  seconded  by  his  three  sons  and  his 
sons-in-law,  to  assemble  in  the  rooms  of  his  official  residence 
the  best  matches  which  Paris  and  the  various  deputations  from 
departments  could  offer.  The  splendor  of  his  entertainments, 
the  luxury  of  his  dining-room,  and  his  dinners,  fragrant  with 
truffles,  rivaled  the  famous  banquets  by  which  the  ministers 
of  that  time  secured  the  vote  of  their  parliamentary  recruits. 

The  honorable  deputy  was  consequently  pointed  at  as  a 
most  influential  corrupter  of  the  legislative  honesty  of  the 
illustrious  Chamber  that  was  dying  as  it  would  seem  of  indi- 
gestion. A  whimsical  result !  his  efforts  to  get  his  daughter 
married  secured  him  a  splendid  popularity.  He  perhaps 
found  some  covert  advantage  in  selling  his  truffles  twice  over. 
This  accusation,  started  by  certain  mocking  Liberals,  who 
made  up  by  their  flow  of  words  for  their  small  following  in 
the  Chamber,  was  not  a  success.  The  Poitevin  gentleman 
had  always  been  so  noble  and  so  honorable,  that  he  was  not 
once  the  object  of  those  epigrams  which  the  malicious  jour- 
nalism of  the  day  hurled  at  the  three  hundred  votes  of  the 
centre,  at  the  Ministers,  the  cooks,  the  directors-general,  the 
princely  Amphitryons,  and  the  official  supporters  of  the 
Villele  Ministry. 

At  the  close  of  this  campaign,  during  which  Monsieur  de 
Fontaine  had  on  several  occasions  brought  out  all  his  forces, 
he  believed  that  this  time  the  procession  of  suitors  would  not 
be  a  mere  dissolving  view  in  his  daughter's  eyes ;  that  it  was 
time  she  should  make  up  her  mind.  He  felt  a  certain  inward 
satisfaction  at  having  well  fulfilled  his  duty  as  a  father.  And 
having  left  no  stone  unturned,  he  hoped  that,  among  so  many 
hearts  laid  at  Emilie's  feet,  there  might  be  one  to  which  her 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  293 

caprice  might  give  a  preference.  Incapable  of  repeating  such 
an  effort,  and  tired,  too,  of  his  daughter's  conduct,  one 
morning,  toward  the  end  of  Lent,  when  the  business  at  the 
Chamber  did  not  demand  his  vote,  he  determined  to  ask 
what  her  views  were.  While  his  valet  was  artistically  decorat- 
ing his  bald  yellow  head  with  the  delta  of  powder  which,  with 
the  hanging  "  aile s  de pigeon"  (pigeon-wings),  completed  his 
venerable  style  of  hairdressing,  Emilie's  father,  not  without 
some  secret  misgivings,  told  his  old  servant  to  go  and  desire 
the  haughty  damsel  to  appear  in  the  presence  of  the  head  of 
the  family. 

"Joseph,"  he  added,  when  his  hair  was  dressed,  "take 
away  that  towel,  draw  back  the  curtains,  put  those  chairs 
square,  shake  the  rug,  and  lay  it  quite  straight.  Dust  every- 
thing. Now,  air  the  room  a  little  by  opening  the  window." 

The  count  multiplied  his  orders,  putting  Joseph  out  of 
breath,  and  the  old  servant,  understanding  his  master's  inten- 
tions, aired  and  tidied  the  room,  of  course  the  least  cared  for  of 
any  in  the  house,  and  succeeded  in  giving  a  look  of  harmony 
to  the  files  of  bills,  the  letter-boxes,  the  books  and  furniture 
of  this  sanctum,  where  the  interests  of  the  royal  demesnes 
were  debated  over.  When  Joseph  had  reduced  this  chaos  to 
some  sort  of  order,  and  brought  to  the  front  such  things  as 
might  be  most  pleasing  to  the  eye,  as  if  it  were  a  store-front, 
or  such  as  by  their  color  might  give  the  effect  of  a  kind  of 
official  poetry,  he  stood  for  a  minute  in  the  midst  of  the 
labyrinth  of  papers  piled  in  some  places  even  on  the  floor, 
admired  his  handiwork,  jerked  his  head,  and  went. 

The  anxious  sinecure-holder  did  not  share  his  retainer's 
favorable  opinion.  Before  seating  himself  in  his  deep  chair, 
whose  rounded  back  screened  him  from  draughts,  he  looked 
round  him  doubtfully,  examined  his  dressing-gown  with  a 
hostile  expression,  shook  off  a  few  grains  of  snuff,  carefully 
wiped  his  nose,  arranged  the  tongs  and  shovel,  made  the  fire, 
pulled  up  the  heels  of  his  slippers,  jerked  out  his  little  queue 


294  THE   SCEAUX  BALL. 

of  hair  which  had  lodged  horizontally  between  the  collar  of 
his  vest  and  that  of  his  dressing-gown,  restoring  it  to  its  per- 
pendicular position  ;  then  he  swept  up  the  ashes  of  the  hearth, 
which  bore  witness  to  a  persistent  catarrh.  Finally,  the  old 
man  did  not  settle  himself  till  he  had  once  more  looked  all 
over  the  room,  hoping  that  nothing  could  give  occasion  to  the 
saucy  and  impertinent  remarks  with  which  his  daughter  was 
apt  to  answer  his  good  advice.  On  this  occasion  he  was 
anxious  not  to  compromise  his  dignity  as  a  father.  He 
daintily  took  a  pinch  of  snuff,  cleared  his  throat  two  or  three 
times,  as  if  he  were  about  to  demand  a  count  out  of  the 
House ;  then  he  heard  his  daughter's  light  step,  and  she  came 
in  humming  an  air  from  "II  Barbiere." 

"  Good-morning,  papa.  What  do  you  want  with  me  so 
early?"  Having  sung  these  words,  as  though  they  were  the 
refrain  of  the  melody,  she  kissed  the  count,  not  with  the 
familiar  tenderness  which  makes  a  daughter's  love  so  sweet  a 
thing,  but  with  the  light  carelessness  of  a  mistress  confident 
of  pleasing,  whatever  she  may  do. 

"My  dear  child,"  said  Monsieur  de  Fontaine,  gravely,  "I 
sent  for  you  to  talk  very  seriously  to  you  about  your  future 
prospects.  You  are  at  this  moment  under  the  necessity  of 
making  such  a  choice  of  a  husband  as  may  secure  you  durable 
happiness " 

"My  good  father,"  replied  Emilie,  assuming  her  most 
coaxing  tone  of  voice  to  interrupt  him,  "  it  strikes  me  that 
the  armistice  on  which  we  agreed  as  to  my  suitors  is  not  yet 
expired." 

"Emilie,  we  must  to-day  forbear  from  jesting  on  so  im- 
portant a  matter.  For  some  time  past  the  efforts  of  those  who 
most  truly  love  you,  my  dear  child,  have  been  concentrated 
on  the  endeavor  to  settle  you  suitably ;  and  you  would  be 
guilty  of  ingratitude  in  meeting  with  levity  those  proofs  of 
kindness  which  I  am  not  alone  in  lavishing  on  you." 

As  she  heard  these  words,  after  flashing  a  mischievously  in- 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  295 

quisitive  look  at  the  furniture  of  her  father's  study,  the  young 
girl  brought  forward  the  armchair  which  looked  as  if  it  had 
been  least  used  by  petitioners,  set  it  at  the  side  of  the  fire- 
place so  as  to  sit  facing  her  father,  and  settled  herself  in  so 
solemn  an  attitude  that  it  was  impossible  not  to  read  in  it  a 
mocking  attention,  crossing  her  arms  over  the  dainty  trim- 
mings of  a  snow-white  pelerine,  and  ruthlessly  crushing  its 
endless  frills  of  white  tulle.  After  a  laughing  side-glance  at 
her  old  father's  troubled  face,  she  broke  silence. 

"  I  never  heard  you  say,  my  dear  father,  that  the  Govern- 
ment issued  its  instructions  in  its  dressing-gown.  However," 
and  she  smiled,  "  that  does  not  matter ;  the  mob  is  probably 
not  particular.  Now,  what  are  your  proposals  for  legislation, 
and  your  official  introductions?" 

"  I  shall  not  always  be  able  to  make  them,  headstrong  girl ! 
Listen,  Emilie.  It  is  my  intention  no  longer  to  compromise 
my  reputation,  which  is  part  of  my  children's  fortune,  by  re- 
cruiting the  regiment  of  dancers  which,  spring  after  spring, 
you  put  to  rout.  You  have  already  been  the  cause  of  many 
dangerous  misunderstandings  with  certain  families.  I  hope  to 
make  you  perceive  more  truly  the  difficulties  of  your  position 
and  of  ours.  You  are  two-and-twenty,  my  dear  child,  and  you 
ought  to  have  been  married  nearly  three  years  since.  Your  bro- 
thers and  your  two  sisters  are  richly  and  happily  provided  for. 
But,  my  dear,  the  expenses  occasioned  by  these  marriages,  and 
the  style  of  housekeeping  you  require  of  your  mother,  have 
made  such  inroads  on  our  income  that  I  can  hardly  promise 
you  a  hundred  thousand  francs  as  a  marriage  portion.  From 
this  day  forth  I  shall  think  only  of  providing  for  your  mother, 
who  must  not  be  sacrificed  to  her  children.  Emilie,  if  I  were 
to  be  taken  from  my  family,  Madame  de  Fontaine  could  not 
be  left  at  anybody's  mercy,  and  ought  to  enjoy  the  affluence 
which  I  have  given  her  too  late  as  a  reward  of  her  devotion  in 
my  misfortunes.  You  see,  my  child,  that  the  amount  of  your 
fortune  bears  no  relation  to  your  notions  of  grandeur.  Even 


296  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

that  would  be  such  a  sacrifice  as  I  have  not  hitherto  made  for 
either  of  my  children ;  but  they  have  generously  agreed  not  to 
expect  in  the  future  any  compensation  for  the  advantage  thus 
given  to  a  too  favored  child." 

"In  their  position  !  "  said  Emilie,  with  an  ironical  toss  of 
her  head. 

"  My  dear,  do  not  so  depreciate  those  who  love  you.  Only 
the  poor  are  generous  as  a  rule ;  the  rich  have  always  excellent 
reasons  for  not  handing  over  twenty  thousand  francs  to  a  rela- 
tion. Come,  my  child,  do  not  pout,  let  us  talk  rationally. 
Among  the  young  marrying  men  have  you  noticed  Monsieur 
de  Manerville?" 

"  Oh,  he  minces  his  words — he  says  Zules  instead  of  Jules ; 
he  is  always  looking  at  his  feet,  because  he  thinks  them  small, 
and  he  gazes  at  himself  in  the  glass.  Beside,  he  is  fair.  I 
don't  like  fair  men." 

"Well,  then,  Monsieur  de  Beaudenord?" 

"  He  is  not  noble  !  he  is  ill-made  and  stout.  He  is  dark, 
it  is  true.  If  the  two  gentlemen  could  agree  to  combine 
their  fortunes,  and  the  first  would  give  his  name  and  his 
figure  to  the  second,  who  should  keep  his  dark  hair,  then — • 
perhaps " 

"What  can  you  say  against  Monsieur  de  Rastignac?" 

"Madame  de  Nucingen  has  made  a  banker  of  him,"  she 
said  with  meaning. 

"And  our  cousin,  the  Vicomte  de  Portenduere  ?  " 

"  A  mere  boy,  who  dances  badly ;  beside,  he  has  no  for- 
tune. And,  after  all,  papa,  none  of  these  people  have  titles. 
I  want,  at  least,  to  be  a  countess  like  my  mother." 

*'  Have  you  seen  no  one,  then,  this  winter ?  " 

"  No,  papa." 

"  What  then  do  you  want  ?  " 

"The  son  of  a  peer  of  France." 

"  My  dear  girl,  you  are  mad  !  "  said  Monsieur  de  Fontaine, 
rising. 


THE   SCEAUX  BALL.  297 

But  he  suddenly  lifted  his  eyes  to  heaven,  and  seemed  to 
find  a  fresh  source  of  resignation  in  some  religious  thought ; 
then,  with  a  look  of  fatherly  pity  at  his  daughter,  who  herself 
was  moved,  he  took  her  hand,  pressed  it,  and  said  with  deep 
feeling:  "God  is  my  witness,  poor  mistaken  child,  I  have 
conscientiously  discharged  my  duty  to  you  as  a  father— con- 
scientiously, do  I  say?  Most  lovingly,  my  Emilie.  Yes, 
God  knows !  This  winter  I  have  brought  before  you  more 
than  one  good  man,  whose  character,  whose  habits,  and  whose 
temper  were  known  to  me,  and  all  seemed  worthy  of  you. 
My  child,  my  task  is  done.  From  this  day  forth  you  are  the 
arbiter  of  your  own  fate,  and  I  consider  myself  both  happy 
and  unhappy  at  finding  myself  relieved  of  the  heaviest  of 
paternal  functions.  I  know  not  whether  you  will  for  any  long 
time,  now,  hear  a  voice  which,  to  you,  has  never  been  stern  ; 
but  remember  that  conjugal  happiness  does  not  rest  so  much 
on  brilliant  qualities  and  ample  fortune  as  on  reciprocal 
esteem.  This  happiness  is,  in  its  nature,  modest,  and  devoid 
of  show.  So  now,  my  dear,  my  consent  is  given  beforehand, 
whoever  the  son-in-law  may  be  whom  you  introduce  to  me  ; 
but  if  you  should  be  unhappy,  remember  you  will  have  no 
right  to  accuse  your  father.  I  shall  not  refuse  to  take  proper 
steps  and  help  you,  only  your  choice  must  be  serious  and  final. 
I  will  never  twice  compromise  the  respect  due  to  my  white 
hairs." 

The  affection  thus  expressed  by  her  father,  the  solemn  tones 
of  his  urgent  address,  deeply  touched  Mademoiselle  de  Fon- 
taine ;  but  she  concealed  her  emotion,  seated  herself  on  her 
father's  knees — for  he  had  dropped  all  tremulous  into  his 
chair  again — caressed  him  fondly,  and  coaxed  him  so  engag- 
ingly that  the  old  man's  brow  cleared.  As  soon  as  Emilie 
thought  that  her  father  had  gotten  over  his  painful  agitation,  she 
said  in  a  gentle  voice  :  "I  have  to  thank  you  for  your  grace- 
ful attention,  my  dear  father.  You  have  had  your  room  set 
in  order  to  receive  your  beloved  daughter.  You  did  not  per- 


298  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

haps  know  that  you  would  find  her  so  foolish  and  so  head- 
strong. But,  papa,  is  it  so  difficult  to  get  married  to  a  peer 
of  France?  You  declared  that  they  were  manufactured  by 
dozens.  At  least,  you  will  not  refuse  to  advise  me." 

"  No,  my  poor  child,  no ;  and  more  than  once  I  may  have 
occasion  to  cry,  '  Beware  !  '  Remember  that  the  making  of 
peers  is  so  recent  a  force  in  our  government  machinery  that 
they  have  no  great  fortunes.  Those  who  are  rich  look  to  be- 
coming richer.  The  wealthiest  member  of  our  peerage  has 
not  half  the  income  of  the  least  rich  lord  in  the  English  Upper 
Chamber.  Thus  all  the  French  peers  are  on  the  lookout  for 
great  heiresses  for  their  sons,  wherever  they  may  meet  with 
them.  The  necessity  in  which  they  find  themselves  of  thus 
marrying  for  money  will  certainly  exist  for  at  least  two  cen- 
turies. 

"  Pending  such  a  fortunate  accident  as  you  long  for — and 
this  fastidiousness  may  cost  you  the  best  years  of  your  life — 
your  attractions  might  work  a  miracle,  for  men  often  marry 
for  love  in  these  days.  When  experience  lurks  behind  so 
sweet  a  face  as  yours  it  may  achieve  wonders.  In  the  first 
place,  have  you  not  the  gift  of  recognizing  virtue  in  the 
greater  or  small  dimensions  of  a  man's  body?  This  is  no 
small  matter  !  To  so  wise  a  young  person  as  you  are,  I  need 
not  enlarge  on  all  the  difficulties  of  the  enterprise.  I  am 
sure  that  you  would  never  attribute  good-sense  to  a  stranger 
because  he  had  a  handsome  face,  or  all  the  virtues  because  he 
had  a  fine  figure.  And  I  am  quite  of  your  mind  in  thinking 
that  the  sons  of  peers  ought  to  have  an  air  peculiar  to  them- 
selves, and  perfectly  distinctive  manners.  Though  nowadays 
no  external  sign  stamps  a  man  of  rank,  those  young  men  will 
have,  perhaps,  to  you  the  indefinable  something  that  will 
reveal  it.  Then,  again,  you  have  your  heart  well  in  hand, 
like  a  good  horseman  who  is  sure  his  steed  cannot  bolt.  Luck 
be  with  you,  my  dear  !  " 

"You  are  making  game  of  me,  papa.     Well,  I  assure  you 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  299 

that  I  would  rather  die  in  Mademoiselle  de  Conde's  convent 
than  not  be  the  wife  of  a  peer  of  France." 

She  slipped  out  of  her  father's  arms,  and,  proud  of  being 
her  own  mistress,  went  off  singing  the  air  of  Cara  non  dubitare, 
in  the  "  Matrimonio  Segreto." 

As  it  happened,  the  family  were  that  day  keeping  the  anni- 
versary of  a  family  f&te.  At  dessert,  Madame  Planat,  the 
receiver-general's  wife,  spoke  with  some  enthusiasm  of  a 
young  American  owning  an  immense  fortune,  who  had  fallen 
passionately  in  love  with  her  sister,  and  made  through  her 
the  most  splendid  proposals. 

"A  banker,  I  rather  think,"  observed  Emilie  carelessly. 
"I  do  not  like  money  dealers." 

"But,  Emilie,"  replied  the  Baron  de  Villaine,  the  husband 
of  the  count's  second  daughter,  "you  do  not  like  lawyers 
either;  so  that  if  you  refuse  men  of  wealth  who  have  not 
titles,  I  do  not  quite  see  in  what  class  you  are  to  choose  a 
husband." 

"Especially,  Emilie,  with  your  standard  of  slimness," 
added  the  lieutenant-general. 

11 1  know  what  I  want,"  replied  the  young  lady. 

"  My  sister  wants  a  fine  name,  a  fine  young  man,  fine  pros- 
pects, and  a  hundred  thousand  francs  a  year,"  said  the 
Baronne  de  Fontaine.  "  Monsieur  de  Marsay,  for  instance." 

"  I  know,  my  dear,"  retorted  Emilie,  '  that  I  do  not  mean 
to  make  such  a  foolish  marriage  as  some  I  have  seen.  More- 
over, to  put  an  end  to  these  matrimonial  discussions,  I  hereby 
declare  that  I  shall  look  on  any  one  who  talks  to  me  of 
marriage  as  a  foe  to  my  peace  of  mind." 

An  uncle  of  Emilie's,  a  vice-admiral,  whose  fortune  had 
just  been  increased  by  twenty  thousand  francs  a  year  in  con- 
sequence of  the  Act  of  Indemnity,  and  a  man  of  seventy, 
feeling  himself  privileged  to  say  hard  things  to  his  grand- 
niece,  on  whom  he  doted,  in  order  to  mollify  the  bitter  tone 
of  the  discussion,  now  exclaimed — 


300  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

"Do  not  tease  my  poor  little  Emilie;  don't  you  see  she  is 
waiting  till  the  Due  de  Bordeaux  comes  of  age !  " 

The  old  man's  pleasantry  was  received  with  general 
laughter. 

"  Take  care  I  don't  marry  you,  old  fool !  "  replied  the  young 
girl,  whose  last  words  were  happily  drowned  in  the  noise. 

"My  dear  children,"  said  Madame  de  Fontaine,  to  soften 
this  saucy  retort,  "  Emilie,  like  you,  will  take  no  advice  but 
her  mother's." 

"  Bless  me  !  I  shall  take  no  advice  but  my  own  in  a  matter 
which  concerns  no  one  but  myself,"  said  Mademoiselle  de 
Fontaine  very  distinctly. 

At  this  all  eyes  were  turned  to  the  head  of  the  family. 
Every  one  seemed  anxious  as  to  what  he  would  do  to  assert 
his  dignity.  The  venerable  gentleman  enjoyed  much  con- 
sideration, not  only  in  the  world  ;  happier  than  many  fathers, 
he  was  also  appreciated  by  his  family,  all  its  members  having 
a  just  esteem  for  the  solid  qualities  by  which  he  had  been  able 
to  make  their  fortunes.  Hence  he  was  treated  with  the  deep 
respect  which  is  shown  by  English  families,  and  some  aristo- 
cratic houses  on  the  continent,  to  the  living  representative  of 
an  ancient  pedigree.  Deep  silence  had  fallen ;  and  the 
guests  looked  alternately  from  the  spoilt  girl's  proud  and 
sulkly  pout  to  the  severe  faces  of  Monsieur  and  Madame  de 
Fontaine. 

"  I  have  made  my  daughter  Emilie  mistress  of  her  own 
fate,"  was  the  reply  spoken  by  the  count  in  a  deep  voice. 

Relations  and  guests  gazed  at  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine 
with  mingled  curiosity  and  pity.  The  words  seemed  to 
declare  that  fatherly  affection  was  weary  of  the  contest  with  a 
character  that  the  whole  family  knew  to  be  incorrigible.  The 
sons-in-law  muttered,  and  the  brothers  glanced  at  their  wives 
with  mocking  smiles.  From  that  moment  every  one  ceased 
to  take  any  interest  in  the  haughty  girl's  prospects  of  marriage. 
Her  old  uncle  was  the  only  person  who,  as  an  old  sailor,  ven- 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  301 

tured  to  stand  on  her  tack,  and  take  her  broadsides,  without 
ever  troubling  himself  to  return  her  fire. 

When  the  fine  weather  was  settled,  and  after  the  budget 
was  voted,  the  whole  family — a  perfect  example  of  the  parlia- 
mentary families  on  the  northern  side  of  the  Channel  who 
have  a  footing  in  every  government  department,  and  ten  votes 
in  the  House  of  Commons — flew  away  like  a  brood  of  young 
birds  to  the  charming  neighborhoods  of  Aulnay,  Antony,  and 
Chatenay.  The  wealthy  receiver-general  had  lately  purchased 
in  this  part  of  the  world  a  country-house  for  his  wife,  who 
remained  in  Paris  only  during  the  session.  Though  the  fair 
Emilie  despised  the  commonalty,  her  feeling  was  not  carried 
so  far  as  to  scorn  the  advantages  of  a  fortune  acquired  in  a 
profession ;  so  she  accompanied  her  sister  to  the  sumptuous 
villa,  less  out  of  affection  for  the  members  of  her  family  who 
were  visiting  there,  than  because  fashion  has  ordained  that 
every  woman  who  has  any  self-respect  must  leave  Paris  in  the 
summer.  The  green  seclusion  of  Sceaux  answered  to  perfec- 
tion the  requirements  of  good  style  and  of  the  duties  of  an 
official  position. 

As  it  is  extremely  doubtful  that  the  fame  of  the  "  Bal  de 
Sceaux  "  should  ever  have  extended  beyond  the  borders  of  the 
Department  of  the  Seine,  it  will  be  necessary  to  give  some 
account  of  this  weekly  festivity,  which  at  that  time  was  im- 
portant enough  to  threaten  to  become  an  institution.  The 
environs  of  the  little  town  of  Sceaux  enjoy  a  reputation  due  to 
the  scenery,  which  is  considered  enchanting.  Perhaps  it  is 
quite  ordinary,  and  owes  its  fame  only  to  the  stupidity  of  the 
Paris  townsfolk,  who,  emerging  from  the  stony  abyss  in  which 
they  are  buried,  would  find  something  to  admire  in  the  flats 
of  La  Beauce.  However,  as  the  poetic  shades  of  Aulnay,  the 
hillsides  of  Antony,  and  the  valley  of  the  Bievre  are  peopled 
with  artists  who  have  traveled  far,  by  foreigners  who  are  very 
hard  to  please,  and  by  a  great  many  pretty  women  not  devoid 
of  taste,  it  is  to  be  supposed  that  the  Parisians  are  right.  But 


302  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

Sceaux  possesses  another  attraction  not  less  powerful  to  the 
Parisian.  In  the  midst  of  a  garden  whence  there  are  delight- 
ful views  stands  a  large  rotunda  open  on  all  sides,  with  a 
light,  spreading  roof  supported  on  elegant  pillars.  This  rural 
baldachino  shelters  a  dancing-floor.  The  most  stuck-up  land- 
owners of  the  neighborhood  rarely  fail  to  make  an  excursion 
thither  once  or  twice  during  the  season,  arriving  at  this  rustic 
palace  of  Terpsichore  either  in  dashing  parties  on  horseback, 
or  in  the  light  and  elegant  carriages  which  powder  the  philo- 
sophical pedestrian  with  dust.  The  hope  of  meeting  some 
women  of  fashion,  and  of  being  seen  by  them — and  the  hope, 
less  often  disappointed,  of  seeing  young  peasant  girls,  as  wily 
as  judges — crowds  the  ballroom  at  Sceaux  with  numerous 
swarms  of  lawyers'  clerks,  of  the  disciples  of  ^Esculapius,  and 
other  youths  whose  complexions  are  kept  pale  and  moist  by 
the  damp  atmosphere  of  Paris  back-shops.  And  a  good  many 
bourgeois  marriages  have  had  their  beginning  to  the  sound 
of  the  band  occupying  the  centre  of  this  circular  ballroom. 
If  that  roof  could  speak,  what  love-stories  could  it  not  tell ! 

This  interesting  medley  gave  the  Sceaux  balls  at  that  time 
a  spice  of  more  amusement  than  those  of  two  or  three  places 
of  the  same  kind  near  Paris ;  and  it  had  incontestable  advan- 
tages in  its  rotunda,  and  the  beauty  of  its  situation  and  its 
gardens.  Emilie  was  the  first  to  express  a  wish  to  play  at 
being  "common  folk"  at  this  gleeful  suburban  entertainment, 
and  promised  herself  immense  pleasure  in  mingling  with  the 
crowd.  Everybody  wondered  at  her  desire  to  wander  through 
such  a  mob ;  but  is  there  not  a  keen  pleasure  to  grand  people 
in  an  incognito?  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  amused  herself 
frith  imagining  all  these  town-bred  figures ;  she  fancied  her- 
self leaving  the  memory  of  a  bewitching  glance  and  smile 
stamped  on  more  than  one  storekeeper  heart,  laughed  before- 
hand at  the  damsels'  airs,  and  sharpened  her  pencils  for  the 
scenes  she  proposed  to  sketch  in  her  satirical  album.  Sunday 
could  not  come  soon  enough  to  satisfy  her  impatience. 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  3UJ 

The  party  from  the  Villa  Planat  set  out  on  foot,  so  as  not 
to  betray  the  rank  of  the  personages  who  were  about  to  honor 
the  ball  with  their  presence.  They  dined  early.  And  the 
month  of  May  humored  this  aristocratic  escapade  by  one  of 
its  finest  evenings.  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  was  quite  sur- 
prised to  find  in  the  rotunda  some  quadrilles  made  up  of  per- 
sons who  seemed  to  belong  to  the  upper  classes.  Here  and 
there,  indeed,  were  some  young  men  who  look  as  though  they 
must  have  saved  for  a  month  to  shine  for  a  day ;  and  she  per- 
ceived several  couples  whose  too  hearty  glee  suggested  nothing 
conjugal ;  still,  she  could  only  glean  instead  of  gathering  a 
harvest.  She  was  amazed  to  see  that  pleasure  in  a  cotton 
dress  was  so  very  like  pleasure  robed  in  satin,  and  that  the 
girls  of  the  middle-class  danced  quite  as  well  as  ladies — nay, 
sometimes  better.  Most  of  the  women  were  simply  and  suit- 
ably dressed.  Those  who  in  this  assembly  represented  the 
ruling  power,  that  is  to  say,  the  country-folk,  kept  apart  with 
wonderful  politeness.  In  fact,  Mademoiselle  Emilie  had  to 
study  the  various  elements  that  composed  the  mixture  before 
she  could  find  any  subject  for  pleasantry.  But  she  had  not 
time  to  give  herself  up  to  malicious  criticism,  nor  opportunity 
for  hearing  many  of  the  startling  speeches  which  caricaturists 
so  gladly  pick  up.  The  haughty  young  lady  suddenly  found 
a  flower  in  this  wide  field — the  metaphor  is  reasonable — 
whose  splendor  and  coloring  worked  on  her  imagination  with 
all  the  fascination  of  novelty.  It  often  happens  that  we  look 
at  a  dress,  a  hanging,  a  blank  sheet  of  paper,  with  so  little 
heed  that  we  do  not  at  first  detect  a  stain  or  a  bright  spot 
which  afterward  strikes  the  eye  as  though  it  had  come  there 
at  the  very  instant  when  we  see  it ;  and  by  a  sort  of  moral 
phenomenon  somewhat  resembling  this,  Mademoiselle  de 
Fontaine  discovered  in  a  young  man  the  external  perfections 
of  which  she  had  so  long  dreamed. 

Seated  on  one  of  the   clumsy  chairs  which   marked   the 
boundary  line  of  the  circular  floor,  she  had  placed  herself  at 


304  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

the  end  of  the  row  formed  by  the  family  party,  so  as  to  be 
able  to  stand  up  or  push  forward  as  her  fancy  moved  her, 
treating  the  living  pictures  and  groups  in  the  hall  as  if  she 
were  in  a  picture  gallery ;  impertinently  turning  her  eyeglass 
on  persons  not  two  yards  away,  and  making  her  remarks  as 
though  she  were  criticising  or  praising  a  study  of  a  head,  a 
painting  of  "genre."  Her  eyes,  after  wandering  over  the 
vast  moving  picture,  was  suddenly  caught  by  this  figure, 
which  seemed  to  have  been  placed  on  purpose  in  one  corner 
of  the  canvas,  and  in  the  best  light,  like  a  person  out  of  all 
proportion  with  the  rest. 

The  stranger,  alone  and  absorbed  in  thought,  leaned  lightly 
against  one  of  the  columns  that  supported  the  roof;  his  arms 
were  folded,  and  he  leaned  slightly  on  one  side  as  though  he 
had  placed  himself  there  to  have  his  portrait  taken  by  a 
painter.  His  attitude,  though  full  of  elegance  and  dignity, 
was  devoid  of  affectation.  Nothing  suggested  that  he  had 
half  turned  his  head,  and  bent  it  a  little  to  the  right  like  Alex- 
ander, or  Lord  Byron,  and  some  other  great  men,  for  the  sole 
purpose  of  attracting  attention.  His  fixed  gaze  followed  a  girl 
who  was  dancing,  and  betrayed  some  strong  feeling.  His 
slender,  easy  frame  recalled  the  noble  proportions  of  the 
Apollo.  Fine  black  hair  curled  naturally  over  a  high  fore- 
head. At  a  glance  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  observed  that 
his  linen  was  fine,  his  gloves  fresh,  and  evidently  bought  of  a 
good  maker,  and  his  feet  small  and  well  shod  in  shoes  of 
Irish  kid.  He  had  none  of  the  vulgar  trinkets  displayed  by 
the  dandies  of  the  National  Guard  or  the  Lovelaces  of  the 
counting-house.  A  black  riband,  to  which  an  eyeglass  was 
attached,  hung  over  a  vest  of  the  most  fashionable  cut. 
Never  had  the  fastidious  Emilie  seen  a  man's  eyes  shaded  by 
such  long,  curled  lashes.  Melancholy  and  passion  were  ex- 
pressed in  this  face,  and  the  complexion  was  of  a  manly  olive 
hue.  His  mouth  seemed  ready  to  smile,  unbending  the  cor- 
ners of  eloquent  lips;  but  this,  far  from  hinting  at  gayety, 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  305 

revealed  on  the  contrary  a  sort  of  pathetic  grace.  There  was 
too  much  promise  in  that  head,  too  much  distinction  in  his 
•whole  person,  to  allow  of  one's  saying:  "What  a  handsome 
man!"  or  "What  a  fine  man!"  One  wanted  to  know 
him.  The  most  clear-sighted  observer,  on  seeing  this  stranger, 
could  not  have  helped  taking  him  for  a  clever  man  attracted 
to  this  rural  festivity  by  some  powerful  motive. 

All  these  observations  cost  Emilie  only  a  minute's  attention, 
during  which  the  privileged  gentleman  under  her  severe 
scrutiny  became  the  object  of  her  secret  admiration.  She 
did  not  say  to  herself:  "  He  must  be  a  peer  of  France  !  "  but, 

"Oh,  if  only  he  is  noble,  and  he  surely  must  be " 

Without  finishing  her  thought,  she  suddenly  arose,  and, 
followed  by  her  brother  the  general,  she  made  her  way  toward 
the  column,  affecting  to  watch  the  merry  quadrilles ;  but  by 
a  stratagem  of  the  eye,  familiar  to  women,  she  lost  not  a 
gesture  of  the  young  man  as  she  went  toward  him.  The 
stranger  politely  moved  to  make  way  for  the  new-comers,  and 
went  to  lean  against  another  pillar.  Emilie,  as  much  nettled 
by  his  politeness  as  she  might  have  been  by  an  impertinence, 
began  talking  to  her  brother  in  a  louder  voice  than  good  taste 
enjoined  ;  she  turned  and  tossed  her  head,  gesticulated  eagerly, 
and  laughed  for  no  particular  reason,  less  to  amuse  her 
brother  than  to  attract  the  attention  of  the  imperturbable 
stranger.  None  of  her  little  arts  succeeded.  Mademoiselle 
de  Fontaine  then  followed  the  direction  in  which  his  eyes 
were  fixed,  and  discovered  the  cause  of  his  indifference. 

In  the  midst  of  the  quadrille,  close  in  front  of  them,  a  pale 
girl  was  dancing;  her  face  was  like  one  of  the  divinities 
which  Girodet  has  introduced  into  his  immense  composition 
of  French  warriors  received  by  Ossian.  Emilie  fancied  that 
she  recognized  her  as  a  distinguished  "  mylady "  who  for 
some  months  had  been  living  on  a  neighboring  estate.  Her 
partner  was  a  lad  of  about  fifteen,  with  red  hands,  and  dressed 
in  nankeen  trousers,  a  blue  coat,  and  white  shoes,  which 
20 


306  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

showed  that  the  damsel's  love  of  dancing  made  her  easy  to 
please  in  the  matter  of  partners.  Her  movements  did  not 
betray  her  apparant  delicacy,  but  a  faint  flush  already  tinged  her 
white  cheeks,  and  her  complexion  was  gaining  color.  Made- 
moiselle de  Fontaine  went  nearer,  to  be  able  to  examine  the 
young  lady  at  the  moment  when  she  returned  to  her  place, 
while  the  side-couples  in  their  turn  danced  the  figure.  But 
the  stranger  went  up  to  the  pretty  dancer  and,  leaning  over, 
said  in  a  gentle  but  commanding  tone — 

"  Clara,  my  child,  do  not  dance  any  more." 

Clara  made  a  little  pouting  face,  bent  her  head,  and  finally 
smiled.  When  the  dance  was  over,  the  young  man  wrapped 
her  in  a  cashmere  shawl  with  a  lover's  care,  and  seated  her 
in  a  place  sheltered  from  the  wind.  Very  soon  Mademoiselle 
de  Fontaine,  seeing  them  rise  and  walk  round  the  place  as  if  pre- 
paring to  leave,  found  means  to  follow  them  under  pretense  of 
admiring  the  views  from  the  garden.  Her  brother  lent  him- 
self with  malicious  good-humor  to  the  divagations  of  her 
rather  eccentric  wanderings.  Emilie  then  saw  the  attractive 
couple  get  into  an  elegant  tilbury,  by  which  stood  a  mounted 
groom  in  livery.  At  the  moment  when,  from  his  high  seat, 
the  young  man  was  drawing  the  reins  even,  she  caught  a 
glance  from  his  eye  such  as  men  cast  aimlessly  at  the  crowd ; 
and  then  she  enjoyed  the  feeble  satisfaction  of  seeing  him 
twice  turn  his  head  to  look  at  her.  The  young  lady  did  the 
same.  Was  it  from  jealousy  ? 

"I  imagine  you  have  now  seen  enough  of  the  garden,"  said 
her  brother.  "We  may  go  back  to  the  dancing." 

"  I  am  ready,"  said  she.  "  Do  you  think  the  girl  can  be  a 
relation  of  Lady  Dudley's?" 

"Lady  Dudley  may  have  some  male  relation  staying  with 
her,"  said  the  Baron  de  Fontaine;  "but  a  young  girl! 
No!" 

Next  day  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  expressed  a  wish  to 
take  a  ride.  Then  she  gradually  accustomed  her  old  uncle 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  307 

and  her  brothers  to  escorting  her  in  very  early  rides,  excellent, 
she  declared,  for  her  health.  She  had  a  particular  fancy  for 
the  environs  of  the  hamlet  where  Lady  Dudley  was  living. 
Notwithstanding  her  cavalry  manoeuvres,  she  did  not  meet  the 
stranger  so  soon  as  the  eager  search  she  pursued  might  have 
allowed  her  to  hope.  She  went  several  times  to  the  "  Bal  de 
Sceaux"  without  seeing  the  young  Englishman  who  had 
dropped  from  the  skies  to  pervade  and  beautify  her  dreams. 
Though  nothing  spurs  on  a  young  girl's  infant  passion  so 
effectually  as  an  obstacle,  there  was  a  time  when  Mademoiselle 
de  Fontaine  was  on  the  point  of  giving  up  her  strange  and 
secret  search,  almost  despairing  of  the  success  of  an  enterprise 
whose  singularity  may  give  some  idea  of  the  boldness  of  her 
temper.  In  point  of  fact,  she  might  have  wandered  long 
about  the  village  of  Chatenay  without  meeting  her  Unknown. 
The  fair  Clara — since  that  was  the  name  Emilie  had  over- 
heard— was  not  English,  and  the  stranger  who  escorted  her 
did  not  dwell  among  the  flowery  and  fragrant  bowers  of 
Chatenay. 

One  evening  Emilie,  out  riding  with  her  uncle,  who,  during 
the  fine  weather,  had  gained  a  fairly  long  truce  from  the  gout, 
met  Lady  Dudley.  The  distinguished  foreigner  had  with  her 
in  her  open  carriage  Monsieur  Vandenesse.  Emilie  recog- 
nized the  handsome  couple,  and  her  suppositions  were  at  once 
dissipated  like  a  dream.  Annoyed,  as  any  woman  must  be 
whose  expectations  are  frustrated,  she  touched  up  her  horse  so 
suddenly  that  her  uncle  had  the  greatest  difficulty  in  following 
her,  she  had  set  off  at  such  a  pace. 

"  I  am  too  old,  it  would  seem,  to  understand  these  youthful 
spirits,"  said  the  old  sailor  to  himself  as  he  put  his  horse  to  a 
canter ;  "  or,  perhaps,  young  people  are  not  what  they  used  to 
be.  But  what  ails  my  niece  ?  Now  she  is  walking  at  a  foot- 
pace like  a  gendarme  on  patrol  in  the  Paris  streets.  One 
might  fancy  she  wanted  to  outflank  that  worthy  man,  who 
looks  to  me  like  an  author  dreaming  over  his  poetry,  for  he 


308  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

has,  I  think,  a  notebook  in  his  hand.  My  word,  I  am  a  great 
simpleton  !  Is  not  that  the  very  young  man  we  are  in  search 
of?" 

At  this  idea  the  old  admiral  moderated  his  horse's  pace  so 
as  to  follow  his  niece  without  making  any  noise.  He  had 
played  too  many  pranks  in  the  years  1771  and  soon  after,  a 
time  of  our  history  when  gallantry  was  held  in  honor,  not  to 
guess  at  once  that  by  the  merest  chance  Emilie  had  met  the 
Unknown  of  the  Sceaux  gardens.  In  spite  of  the  film  which 
age  had  drawn  over  his  gray  eyes,  the  Comte  de  Kergarouet 
could  recognize  the  signs  of  extreme  agitation  in  his  niece, 
under  the  unmoved  expression  she  tried  to  give  to  her  features. 
The  girl's  piercing  eyes  were  fixed  in  a  sort  of  dull  amazement 
on  the  stranger,  who  quietly  walked  on  in  front  of  her. 

"Ay,  that's  it,"  thought  the  sailor.  "She  is  following 
him  as  a  pirate  follows  a  merchantman.  Then,  when  she  has 
lost  sight  of  him,  she  will  be  in  despair  at  not  knowing  who 
it  is  she  is  in  love  with,  and  whether  he  is  a  marquis  or  a 
storekeeper.  Really  these  young  heads  need  an  old  fogey 
like  me  always  by  their  side." 

He  unexpectedly  spurred  his  horse  in  such  a  way  as  to  make 
his  niece's  bolt,  and  rode  so  hastily  between  her  and  the 
young  man  on  foot  that  he  obliged  him  to  fall  back  on  to  the 
grassy  bank  which  rose  from  the  roadside.  Then,  abruptly 
drawing  up,  the  count  exclaimed — 

" Couldn't  you  get  out  of  the  way? " 

"I  beg  your  pardon,  monsieur.  But  I  did  not  know  that 
it  lay  with  me  to  apologize  to  you  because  you  almost  rode 
me  down." 

"There,  enough  of  that,  my  good  fellow!"  replied  the 
sailor  harshly,  in  a  sneering  tone  that  was  nothing  less  than 
insulting.  At  the  same  time  the  count  raised  his  hunting- 
crop  as  if  to  strike  his  horse,  and  touched  the  young  fellow's 
shoulder,  saying:  "A  Liberal  citizen  is  a  reasoner;  every 
reasoner  should  be  prudent." 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  309 

The  young  man  went  up  the  bankside  as  he  heard  the 
sarcasm ;  then  he  crossed  his  arms,  and  said  in  an  excited 
tone  of  voice,  "  I  cannot  suppose,  monsieur,  as  I  look  at 
your  white  hairs,  that  you  still  amuse  yourself  by  provoking 
duels " 

"  White  hairs  !  "  cried  the  sailor,  interrupting  him.  "You 
lie  in  your  throat.  They  are  only  gray." 

A  quarrel  thus  begun  had  in  a  few  seconds  become  so  fierce 
that  the  younger  man  forgot  the  moderation  he  had  tried  to 
preserve.  Just  as  the  Comte  de  Kergarouet  saw  his  niece 
coming  back  to  them  with  every  sign  of  the  greatest  uneasi- 
ness, he  told  his  antagonist  his  name,  bidding  him  keep 
silence  before  the  young  lady  intrusted  to  his  care.  The 
stranger  could  not  help  smiling  as  he  gave  a  visiting  card  to 
the  old  man,  desiring  him  to  observe  that  he  was  living  in  a 
country-house  at  Chevreuse;  and,  after  pointing  this  out  to 
him,  he  hurried  away. 

"You  very  nearly  damaged  that  poor  young  counter- 
jumper,  my  dear,"  said  the  count,  advancing  hastily  to  meet 
Emilie.  "Do  you  not  know  how  to  hold  your  horse  in? 
And  there  you  leave  me  to  compromise  my  dignity  in  order 
to  screen  your  folly ;  whereas  if  you  had  but  stopped,  one 
of  your  looks,  or  one  of  your  pretty  speeches — one  of  those 
you  can  make  so  prettily  when  you  are  not  pert — would  have 
set  everything  right,  even  if  you  had  broken  his  arm." 

"  But,  my  dear  uncle,  it  was  your  horse,  not  mine,  that 
caused  the  accident  I  really  think  you  can  no  longer  ride ; 
you  are  not  so  good  a  horseman  as  you  were  last  year.  But 
instead  of  talking  nonsense " 

"Nonsense,  by  Gad  !  Is  it  nothing  to  be  so  impertinent 
to  your  uncle?  " 

"  Ought  we  not  to  go  on  and  inquire  if  the  young  man  is 
hurt?  He  is  limping,  uncle,  only  look  !  " 

"  No,  he  is  running;  I  rated  him  soundly." 

"  Oh,  yes,  uncle ;  I  know  you  there  !  " 


810  THE   SCEAUX  BALL. 

"Stop,"  said  the  count,  pulling  Emilie's  horse  by  the 
bridle,  "  I  do  not  see  the  necessity  of  making  advances  to 
some  storekeeper  who  is  only  too  lucky  to  have  been  thrown 
down  by  a  charming  young  lady,  or  the  commander  of  La 
Belle-Poule." 

"  Why  do  you  think  he  is  anything  so  common,  my  dear 
uncle?  He  seems  to  me  to  have  very  fine  manners." 

"  Every  one  has  manners  nowadays,  my  dear." 

"No,  uncle,  not  everyone  has  the  air  and  style  which 
come  of  the  habit  of  frequenting  drawing-rooms,  and  I  am 
ready  to  make  a  bet  with  you  that  the  young  man  is  of  noble 
birth." 

"  You  had  not  long  to  study  him." 

"  No,  but  it  is  not  the  first  time  I  have  seen  him." 

"  Nor  is  it  the  first  time  you  have  looked  for  him,"  replied 
the  admiral  with  a  laugh. 

Ernilie  colored.  Her  uncle  amused  himself  for  some  time 
with  her  embarrassment ;  then  he  said :  "Emilie,  you  know 
that  I  love  you  as  my  own  child,  precisely  because  you  are 
the  only  member  of  the  family  who  has  the  legitimate  pride 
of  high  birth.  Devil  take  it,  child,  who  could  have  believed 
that  sound  principles  would  become  so  rare?  Well,  I  will  be 
your  confidant.  My  dear  child,  I  see  that  this  young  gentle- 
man is  not  indifferent  to  you.  Hush  !  All  the  family  would 
laugh  at  us  if  we  sailed  under  the  wrong  flag.  You  know 
what  that  means.  We  two  will  keep  our  secret,  and  I  promise 
to  bring  him  straight  into  the  drawing-room." 

"When,  uncle?" 

"To-morrow." 

"But,  my  dear  uncle,  I  am  not  committed  to  anything?" 

"  Nothing  whatever,  and  you  may  bombard  him,  set  fire  to 
him,  and  leave  him  to  founder  like  an  old  hulk  if  you  choose. 
He  won't  be  the  first,  I  fancy?" 

"  You  are  kind,  uncle  !  " 

As  soon  as  the  count  got  home  he  put  on  his  glasses,  quietly 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  311 

took  the  card  out  of  his  pocket,  and  read,  "  Maximilien  Lon- 
gueville,  Rue  du  Sender." 

"  Make  yourself  happy,  my  dear  niece,"  he  said  to  Emilie, 
"  you  may  hook  him  with  an  easy  conscience  ;  he  belongs  to 
one  of  our  historical  families,  and  if  he  is  not  a  peer  of  France, 
he  infallibly  will  be." 

"  How  do  you  know  so  much  ?  " 

"  That  is  my  secret." 

"Then  do  you  know  his  name?" 

The  old  man  bowed  his  gray  head,  which  was  not  unlike  a 
gnarled  oak-stump,  with  a  few  leaves  fluttering  about  it,  with- 
ered by  autumnal  frosts ;  and  his  niece  immediately  began  to 
try  the  ever-new  power  of  her  coquettish  arts.  Long  familiar 
with  the  secret  of  cajoling  the  old  man,  she  lavished  on  him 
the  most  childlike  caresses,  the  tenderest  names;  she  even 
went  so  far  as  to  kiss  him  to  induce  him  to  divulge  so  import- 
ant a  secret.  The  old  man,  who  spent  his  life  in  playing  off 
these  scenes  on  his  niece,  often  paying  for  them  with  a  present 
of  jewelry,  or  by  giving  her  his  box  at  the  opera,  this  time 
amused  himself  with  her  entreaties,  and,  above  all,  her 
caresses.  But  as  he  spun  out  this  pleasure  too  long,  Emilie 
grew  angry,  passed  from  coaxing  to  sarcasm  and  sulks;  then, 
urged  by  curiosity,  she  recovered  herself.  The  diplomatic 
admiral  extracted  a  solemn  promise  from  his  niece  that  she 
would  for  the  future  be  gentler,  less  noisy,  and  less  willful, 
that  she  would  spend  less,  and,  above  all,  tell  him  everything. 
The  treaty  being  concluded,  and  signed  by  a  kiss  impressed  on 
Emilie's  white  brow,  he  led  her  into  a  corner  of  the  room, 
drew  her  on  to  his  knee,  held  the  card  under  his  thumbs  so 
as  to  hide  it,  and  then  uncovered  the  letters,  one  by  one, 
spelling  the  name  of  Longueville ;  but  he  firmly  refused  to 
show  her  anything  more. 

This  incident  added  to  the  intensity  of  Mademoiselle  de 
Fontaine's  secret  sentiment,  and  during  the  chief  part  of  the 
night  she  evolved  the  most  brilliant  pictures  from  the  dreams 


312  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

with  which  she  had  fed  her  hopes.  At  last,  thanks  to  chance, 
to  which  she  had  so  often  appealed,  Emilie  could  now  see 
something  very  unlike  a  chimera  at  the  fountain-head  of  the 
imaginary  wealth  with  which  she  gilded  her  married  life. 
Ignorant,  as  all  young  girls  are,  of  the  perils  of  love  and  mar- 
riage, she  was  passionately  captivated  by  the  externals  of 
marriage  and  love.  Is  not  this  as  much  as  to  say  that  her 
feeling  had  birth  like  all  the  feelings  of  extreme  youth — 
sweet  but  cruel  mistakes,  which  exert  a  fatal  influence  on  the 
lives  of  young  girls  so  inexperienced  as  to  trust  their  own 
judgment  to  take  care  of  their  future  happiness  ? 

Next  morning,  before  Emilie  was  awake,  her  uncle  had 
hastened  to  Chevreuse.  On  recognizing,  in  the  court-yard 
of  an  elegant  little  villa,  the  young  man  he  had  so  deter- 
minedly insulted  the  day  before,  he  went  up  to  him  with  the 
pressing  politeness  of  men  of  the  old  Court. 

"  Why,  my  dear  sir,  who  could  have  guessed  that  I  should 
have  a  brush,  at  the  age  of  seventy-three,  with  the  son,  or  the 
grandson,  of  one  of  my  best  friends  ?  I  am  a  vice-admiral, 
monsieur;  is  not  that  as  much  as  to  say  that  I  think  no  more 
of  fighting  a  duel  than  of  smoking  a  cigar  ?  Why,  in  my  time, 
no  two  young  men  could  be  intimate  till  they  had  seen  the 
color  of  each  other's  blood !  But  'sdeath,  sir,  last  evening, 
sailor-like,  I  had  taken  a  drop  too  much  grog  on  board,  and  I 
ran  you  down.  Shake  hands ;  I  would  rather  take  a  hundred 
rebuffs  from  a  Longueville  than  cause  his  family  the  smallest 
regret." 

However  coldly  the  young  man  tried  to  behave  to  the  Comte 
de  Kergarouet,  he  could  not  long  resist  the  frank  cordiality  of 
his  manner,  and  presently  gave  him  his  hand. 

"You  were  going  out  riding,"  said  the  count.  "  Do  not 
let  me  detain  you.  But,  unless  you  have  other  plans,  I  beg 
you  will  come  to  dinner  to-day  at  the  Villa  Planat.  My 
nephew,  the  Comte  de  Fontaine,  is  a  man  it  is  essential  that 
you  should  know.  Ah,  ha !  And  I  propose  to  make  up  to 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  313 

you  for  my  clumsiness  by  introducing  you  to  five  of  the  pret- 
tiest women  in  Paris.  So,  so,  young  man,  your  brow  is  clear- 
ing !  I  am  fond  of  young  people,  and  I  like  to  see  them 
happy.  Their  happiness  reminds  me  of  the  good  times  of  my 
youth,  when  adventures  were  not  lacking,  any  more  than  duels. 
We  were  gay  dogs  then  !  Nowadays  you  think  and  worry 
over  everything,  as  though  there  had  never  been  a  fifteenth 
and  a  sixteenth  century." 

"But,  monsieur,  are  we  not  in  the  right?  The  sixteenth 
century  only  gave  religious  liberty  to  Europe,  and  the  nine- 
teenth will  give  it  political  lib " 

"  Oh,  we  will  not  talk  politics.  I  am  a  perfect  old  woman 
— Ultra,  you  see.  But  I  do  not  hinder  young  men  from  being 
revolutionary,  so  long  as  they  leave  the  King  at  liberty  to  dis- 
perse their  assemblies." 

When  they  had  gone  a  little  way,  and  the  count  and  his 
companion  were  in  the  heart  of  the  woods,  the  old  sailor 
pointed  out  a  slender  young  birch  sapling,  pulled  up  his  horse, 
took  out  one  of  his  pistols,  and  the  bullet  was  lodged  in  the 
heart  of  the  tree,  fifteen  paces  away. 

"  You  see,  my  dear  fellow,  that  I  am  not  afraid  of  a  duel," 
he  said  with  comical  gravity,  as  he  looked  at  Monsieur 
Longueville. 

"  Nor  am  I,"  replied  the  young  man,  promptly  cocking  his 
pistol ;  he  aimed  at  the  hole  made  by  the  comte's  bullet,  and 
sent  his  own  in  close  to  it. 

"That  is  what  I  call  a  well-educated  man,"  cried  the  ad- 
miral with  enthusiasm. 

During  this  ride  with  the  youth,  whom  he  already  regarded 
as  his  nephew,  he  found  endless  opportunities  of  catechising 
him  on  all  the  trifles  of  which  a  perfect  knowledge  constituted, 
according  to  his  private  code,  an  accomplished  gentleman. 

"  Have  you  any  debts?  "  he  at  last  asked  of  his  companion, 
after  many  other  inquiries. 

"  No,  monsieur." 


314  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

"  What,  you  pay  for  all  you  have?  " 

"  Punctually;  otherwise  we  should  lose  our  credit,  and  every 
sort  of  respect." 

"  But  at  least  you  have  more  than  one  mistress  ?  Ah,  you 
blush,  comrade !  Well,  manners  have  changed.  All  these 
notions  of  lawful  order,  Kantism,  and  liberty  have  spoilt  the 
young  men.  You  have  no  Guimard  now,  no  Duthe,  no  cred- 
itors— and  you  know  nothing  of  heraldry ;  why,  my  dear  young 
friend,  you  are  not  fully  fledged.  The  man  who  does  not  sow 
his  wild  oats  in  the  spring  sows  them  in  the  winter.  If  I  have 
but  eighty  thousand  francs  a  year  at  the  age  of  seventy,  it  is 
because  I  ran  through  the  capital  at  thirty.  Oh  !  with  my 
wife — in  decency  and  honor.  However,  your  imperfections 
will  not  interfere  with  my  introducing  you  at  the  Pavilion 
Planat.  Remember  you  have  promised  to  come,  and  I  shall 
expect  you." 

"  What  an  odd  little  old  man !  "  said  Longueville  to  himself. 
"  He  is  so  jolly  and  hale ;  but  though  he  wishes  to  seem  a 
good  fellow,  I  will  not  trust  him  too  far." 

Next  day,  at  about  four  o'clock,  when  the  house  party  were 
dispersed  in  the  drawing-rooms  and  billiard-room,  a  servant 
announced  to  the  inhabitants  of  the  Villa  Planat,  "Monsieur 
de  Longueville."  On  hearing  the  name  of  the  old  admiral's 
protege,  every  one,  down  to  the  billiard-player  who  was 
about  to  miss  his  stroke,  rushed  in,  as  much  to  study  Made- 
moiselle de  Fontaine:s  countenance  as  to  judge  of  this  phoenix 
of  men,  who  had  earned  honorable  mention  to  the  detriment 
of  so  many  rivals.  A  simple  but  elegant  style  of  dress,  an  air 
of  perfect  ease,  polite  manners,  a  pleasant  voice  with  a  ring  in 
it  which  found  a  response  in  the  hearer's  heart-strings,  won  the 
good-will  of  the  family  for  Monsieur  Longueville.  He  did 
not  seem  unaccustomed  to  the  luxury  of  the  receiver-general's 
ostentatious  mansion.  Though  his  conversation  was  that  of  a 
man  of  the  world,  it  was  easy  to  discern  that  he  had  had  a 
brilliant  education,  and  that  his  knowledge  was  as  thorough 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  315 

as  it  was  extensive.  He  knew  so  well  the  right  thing  to  say 
in  a  discussion  on  naval  architecture,  trivial,  it  is  true,  started 
by  the  old  admiral,  that  one  of  the  ladies  remarked  that  he 
must  have  passed  through  the  Polytechnic  School. 

"And  I  think,  madame,"  he  replied,  "  that  I  may  regard  it 
as  an  honor  to  gain  admission." 

In  spite  of  urgent  pressing,  he  refused  politely  but  firmly  to 
be  kept  to  dinner,  and  put  an  end  to  the  persistency  of  the 
ladies  by  saying  that  he  was  the  Hippocrates  of  his  young 
sister,  whose  delicate  health  required  great  care. 

"  Monsieur  is  perhaps  a  medical  man  ?  "  asked  one  of  Emi- 
lie's  sisters-in-law  with  ironical  meaning. 

"Monsieur  has  left  the  Polytechnic,"  Mademoiselle  de 
Fontaine  kindly  put  in  ;  her  face  had  flushed  with  richer  color, 
as  she  learned  that  the  young  lady  of  the  ball  was  Monsieur 
Longueville's  sister. 

"But,  my  dear,  he  may  be  a  doctor  and  yet  have  been  to 
the  Polytechnic  School — is  it  not  so,  monsieur?" 

"  There  is  nothing  to  prevent  it,  madame,"  replied  the 
young  man. 

Every  eye  was  on  Emilie,  who  was  gazing  with  uneasy  curi- 
osity at  the  fascinating  stranger.  She  breathed  more  freely 
when  he  added,  not  without  a  smile,  "  I  have  not  the  honor 
of  belonging  to  the  medical  profession  ;  and  I  even  gave  up 
going  into  the  Engineers  in  order  to  preserve  my  independ- 
ence." 

"And  you  did  well,"  said  the  count.  "But  how  can  you 
regard  it  as  an  honor  to  be  a  doctor  ?  "  added  the  Breton  noble- 
man. "Ah,  my  young  friend,  such  a  man  as  you " 

"  Monsieur  le  Comte,  I  respect  every  profession  that  has  a 
useful  purpose." 

"  Well,  in  that  we  agree.  You  respect  those  professions,  I 
imagine,  as  a  young  man  respects  a  dowager." 

Monsieur  Longueville  made  his  visit  neither  too  long  nor 
too  short.  He  left  at  the  moment  when  he  saw  that  he  had 


316  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

pleased  everybody,  and  that  each  one's  curiosity  about  him 
had  been  aroused. 

"  He  is  a  cunning  rascal !  "  said  the  count,  coming  into  the 
drawing-room  after  seeing  him  to  the  door. 

Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine,  who  had  been  in  the  secret  of 
this  call,  had  dressed  with  some  care  to  attract  the  young 
man's  eye;  but  she  had  the  little  disappointment  of  finding 
that  he  did  not  bestow  on  her  so  much  attention  as  she  thought 
she  deserved.  The  family  were  a  good  deal  surprised  at  the 
silence  into  which  she  had  retired.  Emilie  generally  displayed 
all  her  arts  for  the  benefit  of  new-comers,  her  witty  prattle, 
and  the  inexhaustible  eloquence  of  her  eyes  and  attitudes. 
Whether  it  was  that  the  young  man's  pleasing  voice  and  attrac- 
tive manners  had  charmed  her,  that  she  was  seriously  in  love, 
and  that  this  feeling  had  worked  a  change  in  her,  her  de- 
meanor had  lost  all  its  affectations.  Being  simple  and  natural, 
she  must,  no  doubt,  have  seemed  more  beautiful.  Some  of 
her  sisters,  and  an  old  lady,  a  friend  of  the  family,  saw  in  this 
behavior  a  refinement  of  art.  They  supposed  that  Emilie, 
judging  the  man  worthy  of  her,  intended  to  delay  revealing 
her  merits,  so  as  to  dazzle  him  suddenly  when  she  found  that 
she  pleased  him.  Every  member  of  the  family  was  curious  to 
know  what  this  capricious  creature  thought  of  the  stranger ; 
but  when,  during  dinner,  every  one  chose  to  endow  Monsieur 
Longueville  with  some  fresh  quality  which  no  one  else  had 
discovered,  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  sat  for  some  time  in 
silence.  A  sarcastic  remark  of  her  uncle's  suddenly  roused 
her  from  her  apathy ;  she  said,  somewhat  epigrammatically,  that 
such  heavenly  perfection  must  cover  some  great  defect,  and 
that  she  would  take  good  care  how  she  judged  so  gifted  a  man 
at  first  sight. 

"Those  who  please  everybody,  please  nobody,"  she  added; 
"  and  the  worst  of  all  faults  is  to  have  none." 

Like  all  girls  who  are  in  love,  Emilie  cherished  the  hope  of 
being  able  to  hide  her  feelings  at  the  bottom  of  her  heart  by 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  317 

putting  the  Argus-eyes  that  watched  on  the  wrong  tack ;  but 
by  the  end  of  a  fortnight  there  was  not  a  member  of  the  large 
family  party  who  was  not  in  this  little  domestic  secret. 
When  Monsieur  Longueville  called  for  the  third  time,  Emilie 
believed  that  it  was  chiefly  for  her  sake.  This  discovery  gave 
her  such  intoxicating  pleasure  that  she  was  startled  as  she 
reflected  on  it.  There  was  something  in  it  very  painful  to 
her  pride.  Accustomed  as  she  was  to  be  the  centre  of  her 
world,  she  was  obliged  to  recognize  a  force  that  attracted  her 
outside  herself;  she  tried  to  resist,  but  she  could  not  chase 
from  her  heart  the  fascinating  image  of  the  young  man. 

Then  came  some  anxiety.  Two  of  Monsieur  Longueville' s 
qualities,  very  adverse  to  general  curiosity,  and  especially  to 
Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine's,  were  unexpected  modesty  and 
discretion.  He  never  spoke  of  himself,  of  his  pursuits,  or  of 
his  family.  The  hints  Emilie  threw  out  in  conversation,  and 
the  traps  she  laid  to  extract  from  the  young  fellow  some  facts 
concerning  himself,  he  would  evade  with  the  adroitness  of  a 
diplomatist  concealing  a  secret.  If  she  talked  of  painting, 
he  responded  as  a  connoisseur ;  if  she  sat  down  to  play,  he 
showed  without  conceit  that  he  was  a  very  good  pianist ;  one 
evening  he  delighted  all  the  party  by  joining  his  delightful 
voice  to  Emilie's  in  one  of  Cimarosa's  charming  duets.  But 
when  they  tried  to  find  out  whether  he  were  a  professional 
singer,  he  baffled  them  so  pleasantly  that  he  did  not  afford 
these  women,  practiced  as  they  were  in  the  art  of  reading 
feelings,  the  least  chance  of  discovering  to  what  social  sphere 
he  belonged.  However  boldly  the  old  uncle  cast  the  board- 
ing-hooks over  the  vessel,  Longueville  slipped  away  cleverly, 
so  as  to  preserve  the  charm  of  mystery ;  and  it  was  easy  to 
him  to  remain  the  "  handsome  stranger  "  at  the  villa,  because 
curiosity  never  overstepped  the  bounds  of  good  breeding. 

Emilie,  distracted  by  this  reserve,  hoped  to  get  more  out  of 
the  sister  than  the  brother,  in  the  form  of  confidences.  Aided 
by  her  uncle,  who  was  as  skillful  in  such  manoeuvres  as  in 


318  THE   SCEAUX  BALL. 

handling  a  ship,  she  endeavored  to  bring  upon  the  scene  the 
hitherto  unseen  figure  of  Mademoiselle  Clara  Longueville. 
The  family  party  at  the  Villa  Planat  soon  expressed  the 
greatest  desire  to  make  the  acquaintance  of  so  amiable  a 
young  lady,  and  to  give  her  some  amusement.  An  informal 
dance  was  proposed  and  accepted.  The  ladies  did  not  despair 
of  making  a  young  girl  of  sixteen  talk. 

Notwithstanding  the  little  clouds  piled  up  by  suspicion 
and  created  by  curiosity,  a  light  of  joy  shone  in  Emilie's  soul, 
for  she  found  life  delicious  when  thus  intimately  connected 
with  another  than  herself.  She  began  to  understand  the  re- 
lations of  life.  Whether  it  is  that  happiness  makes  us  better, 
or  that  she  was  too  fully  occupied  to  torment  other  people, 
she  became  less  caustic,  more  gentle,  and  indulgent.  This 
change,  in  her  temper  enchanted  and  amazed  her  family. 
Perhaps,  at  last,  her  selfishness  was  being  transformed  to  love. 
It  was  a  deep  delight  to  her  to  look  for  the  arrival  of  her 
bashful  and  unconfessed  adorer.  Though  they  had  not  uttered 
a  word  of  passion,  she  knew  that  she  was  loved,  and  with 
what  art  did  she  not  lead  the  stranger  to  unlock  the  stores  of 
his  information,  which  proved  to  be  varied  !  She  perceived 
that  she,  too,  was  being  studied,  and  that  made  her  endeavor 
to  remedy  the  defects  her  education  had  encouraged.  Was 
not  this  her  first  homage  to  love,  and  a  bitter  reproach  to  her- 
self? She  desired  to  please,  ana  she  was  enchanting;  she 
loved,  and  she  was  idolized.  Her  family,  knowing  that  her 
pride  would  sufficiently  protect  her,  gave  her  enough  freedom 
to  enjoy  the  little  childish  delights  which  give  to  first  love  its 
charm  and  its  violence.  More  than  once  the  young  man  and 
Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  walked,  tete-a-ttte,  in  the  avenues 
of  the  garden,  where  nature  was  dressed  like  a  woman  going 
to  a  ball.  More  than  once  they  had  those  conversations, 
aimless  and  meaningless,  in  which  the  emptiest  phrases  are 
those  which  cover  the  deepest  feelings.  They  often  admired 
together  the  setting  sun  and  its  gorgeous  coloring.  They 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  319 

gathered  daisies  to  pull  the  petals  off,  and  sang  the  most 
impassioned  duets,  using  the  notes  set  down  by  Pergolesi  or 
Rossini  as  faithful  interpreters  to  express  their  secrets. 

The  day  of  the  dance  came.  Clara  Longueville  and  her 
brother,  whom  the  servants  persisted  in  honoring  with  the 
noble  de,  were  the  principal  guests.  For  the  first  time  in  her 
life  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  felt  pleasure  in  a  young  girl's 
triumph.  She  lavished  on  Clara  in  all  sincerity  the  gracious 
petting  and  little  attentions  which  women  generally  give  each 
other  only  to  excite  the  jealousy  of  men.  Emilie  had,  indeed, 
an  object  in  view ;  she  wanted  to  discover  some  secrets.  But, 
being  a  girl,  Mademoiselle  Longueville  showed  even  more 
mother-wit  than  her  brother,  for  she  did  not  even  look  as  if 
she  were  hiding  a  secret,  and  kept  the  conversation  to  subjects 
unconnected  with  personal  interests,  while,  at  the  same  time, 
she  gave  it  so  much  charm  that  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  was 
almost  envious,  and  called  her  "  the  Siren."  Though  Emilie 
had  intended  to  make  Clara  talk,  it  was  Clara,  in  fact,  who 
questioned  Emilie;  she  had  meant  to  judge  her,  and  she  was 
judged  by  her ;  she  was  constantly  provoked  to  find  that  she 
had  betrayed  her  own  character  in  some  reply  which  Clara 
had  extracted  from  her,  while  her  modest  and  candid  manner 
prohibited  any  suspicion  of  perfidy.  There  was  a  moment 
when  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  seemed  sorry  for  an  ill-judged 
sally  against  the  commonalty  to  which  Clara  de  Longueville 
had  led  her. 

"Mademoiselle,"  said  the  sweet  child,  "I  have  heard  so 
much  of  you  from  Maximilien  that  I  had  the  keenest  desire 
to  know  you,  out  of  affection  for  him ;  but  is  not  a  wish  to 
know  you  a  wish  to  love  you?" 

"My  dear  Clara,  I  feared  I  might  have  displeased  you  by 
speaking  thus  of  people  who  are  not  of  noble  birth." 

"Oh,  be  quite  easy.  That  sort  of  discussion  is  pointless 
in  these  days.  As  for  me,  it  does  not  affect  me.  I  am  beside 
the  question." 


320  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

Ambitious  as  the  answer  might  seem,  it  filled  Mademoiselle 
de  Fontaine  with  the  deepest  joy;  for,  like  all  infatuated 
people,  she  explained  it,  as  oracles  are  explained,  in  the  sense 
that  harmonized  with  her  wishes  ;  she  began  dancing  again  in 
higher  spirits  than  ever,  as  she  watched  Longueville,  whose 
figure  and  grace  almost  surpassed  those  of  her  imaginary  ideal. 
She  felt  added  satisfaction  in  believing  him  to  be  well  born, 
her  black  eyes  sparkled,  and  she  danced  with  all  the  pleasure 
that  comes  of  dancing  in  the  presence  of  the  being  we  love. 
The  couple  had  never  understood  each  other  so  well  as  at  this 
moment ;  more  than  once  they  felt  their  finger-tips  thrill  and 
tremble  as  they  were  married  in  the  figures  of  the  dance. 

The  early  autumn  had  come  to  the  handsome  pair,  in  the 
midst  of  country  festivities  and  pleasures;  they  had  aban- 
doned themselves  softly  to  the  tide  of  the  sweetest  sentiment 
in  life,  strengthening  it  by  a  thousand  little  incidents  which 
any  one  can  imagine ;  for  love  is  in  some  respects  always  the 
same.  They  studied  each  other  through  it  all,  as  much  as 
lovers  can. 

"Well,  well;  a  flirtation  never  turned  so  quickly  into  a 
love  match,"  said  the  old  uncle,  who  kept  an  eye  on  the 
two  young  people  as  a  naturalist  watches  an  insect  in  the 
microscope. 

This  speech  alarmed  Monsieur  and  Madame  Fontaine. 
The  old  Vendeen  had  ceased  to  be  so  indifferent  to  his 
daughter's  prospects  as  he  had  promised  to  be.  He  went  to 
Paris  to  seek  information,  and  found  none.  Uneasy  at  this 
mystery,  and  not  yet  knowing  what  might  be  the  outcome  of 
the  inquiry  which  he  had  begged  a  Paris  friend  to  institute 
with  reference  to  the  family  of  Longueville,  he  thought  it  his 
duty  to  warn  his  daughter  to  behave  prudently.  The  fatherly 
admonition  was  received  with  mock  submission  spiced  with 
irony. 

"At  least,  my  dear  Emilie,  if  you  love  him,  do  not  own  it 
to  him." 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  321 

"  My  dear  father,  I  certainly  do  love  him  ;  but  I  will  await 
your  permission  before  I  tell  him  so." 

"  But  remember,  Emilie,  you  know  nothing  of  his  family 
or  his  pursuits." 

"  I  may  be  ignorant,  but  I  am  content  to  be.  But,  father, 
you  wished  to  see  me  married  ;  you  left  me  at  liberty  to  make 
my  choice;  my  choice  is  irrevocably  made — what  more  is 
needful?" 

"It  is  needful  to  ascertain,  my  dear,  whether  the  man  of 
your  choice  is  the  son  of  a  peer  of  France,"  the  venerable 
gentleman  retorted  sarcastically. 

Emilie  was  silent  for  a  moment.  She  presently  raised  her 
head,  looked  at  her  father,  and  said  somewhat  anxiously, 
"Are  not  the  Longuevilles ?" 

"They  became  extinct  in  the  person  of  the  old  Due  de 
Rostein-Limbourg,  who  perished,  under  the  Terror,  on  the 
scaffold  in  1793.  He  was  the  last  representative  of  the  latest 
and  younger  branch." 

"  But,  papa,  there  are  some  very  good  families  descended 
from  bastards.  The  history  of  France  swarms  with  princes 
bearing  the  bar  sinister  on  their  shields." 

"Your  ideas  are  much  changed,"  said  the  old  man,  with  a 
smile. 

The  following  day  was  the  last  that  the  Fontaine  family 
were  to  spend  at  the  Pavilion  Planat.  Emilie,  greatly  dis- 
turbed by  her  father's  warning,  awaited  with  extreme  impa- 
tience the  hour  at  which  young  Longueville  was  in  the  habit 
of  coming,  to  wring  some  explanation  from  him.  She  went 
out  after  dinner,  and  walked  alone  across  the  shrubbery  to- 
ward an  arbor  fit  for  lovers,  where  she  knew  that  the  eager 
youth  would  seek  her;  and  as  she  hastened  thither  she  con- 
sidered of  the  best  way  to  discover  so  important  a  matter 
without  compromising  herself — a  rather  difficult  thing! 
Hitherto  no  direct  avowal  had  sanctioned  the  feelings  which 
bound  her  to  this  stranger.  Like  Maximilien,  she  had  secretly 
21 


D22  THE   SCEAUX  BALL. 

enjoyed  the  sweetness  of  first  love;  but  both  were  equally 
proud,  and  each  feared  to  confess  that  love. 

Maximilien  Longueville,  to  whom  Clara  had  communicated 
her  not  unfounded  suspicions  as  to  Emilie's  character,  was  by 
turns  carried  away  by  the  violence  of  a  young  man's  passion, 
and  held  back  by  a  wish  to  know  and  test  the  woman  to  whom 
he  would  be  intrusting  his  happiness.  His  love  had  not  hin- 
dered him  from  perceiving  in  Emilie  the  prejudices  which 
marred  her  young  nature ;  but  before  attempting  to  counter- 
act them,  he  wished  to  be  sure  that  she  loved  him,  for  he 
would  no  sooner  risk  the  fate  of  his  love  than  of  his  life.  He 
had,  therefore,  persistently  kept  a  silence  to  which  his  looks, 
his  behavior,  and  his  smallest  actions  gave  the  lie. 

On  her  side  the  self-respect  natural  to  a  young  girl,  aug- 
mented in  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  by  the  monstrous  vanity 
founded  on  her  birth  and  beauty,  kept  her  from  meeting  the 
declaration  half-way,  which  her  growing  passion  sometimes 
urged  her  to  invite.  Thus  the  lovers  had  instinctively  under- 
stood the  situation  without  explaining  to  each  other  their 
secret  motives.  There  are  times  in  life  when  such  vagueness 
pleases  youthful  minds.  Just  because  each  had  postponed 
speaking  too  long,  they  seemed  to  be  playing  a  cruel  game  of 
suspense.  He  was  trying  to  discover  whether  he  was  beloved, 
by  the  effort  any  confession  would  cost  his  haughty  mistress ; 
she  every  minute  hoped  that  he  would  break  a  too  respectful 
silence. 

Emilie,  seated  on  a  rustic  bench,  was  reflecting  on  all  that 
had  happened  in  these  three  months  full  of  enchantment. 
Her  father's  suspicions  were  the  last  that  could  appeal  to  her ; 
she  even  disposed  of  them  at  once  by  two  or  three  of  those 
reflections  natural  to  an  inexperienced  girl,  which,  to  her, 
seemed  conclusive.  Above  all,  she  was  convinced  that  it  was 
impossible  that  she  should  deceive  herself.  All  the  summer 
through  she  had  not  been  able  to  detect  in  Maximilien  a 
single  gesture,  or  a  single  word,  which  could  indicate  a  vulgar 


. 


A  SLIGHT  RUSTLING  IN  THE  LEAVES  SHOWED  THAT 
MAXIMILIEN  HAD  BEEN  WATCHING  HER. 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  323 

origin  or  vulgar  occupations ;  nay  more,  his  manner  of  dis- 
cussing things  revealed  a  man  devoted  to  the  highest  interests 
of  the  nation.  "Beside,"  she  reflected,  "an  office  clerk,  a 
banker,  or  a  merchant  would  not  be  at  leisure  to  spend  a 
whole  season  in  paying  his  addresses  to  me  in  the  midst  of 
woods  and  fields ;  wasting  his  time  as  freely  as  a  nobleman 
who  has  life  before  him  free  of  all  care." 

She  had  given  herself  up  to  meditations  far  more  interest- 
ing to  her  than  these  preliminary  thoughts,  when  a  slight 
rustling  in  the  leaves  announced  to  her  that  Maximilien 
had  been  watching  her  for  a  minute,  not  probably  without 
admiration. 

"  Do  you  know  that  it  is  very  wrong  to  take  a  young  girl 
thus  unaware?"  she  asked  him,  smiling. 

11  Especially  when  they  are  busy  with  their  secrets,"  re- 
plied Maximilien  archly. 

"Why  should  I  not  have  my  secrets?  You  certainly  have 
yours." 

"  Then  you  really  were  thinking  of  your  secrets?  "  he  went 
on,  laughing. 

"  No,  I  was  thinking  of  yours.     My  own,  I  know." 

"But  perhaps  my  secrets  are  yours,  and  yours  mine,"  cried 
the  young  man,  softly  seizing  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine's 
hand  and  drawing  it  through  his  arm. 

After  walking  a  few  steps  they  found  themselves  under  a 
clump  of  trees  which  the  hues  of  the  sinking  sun  wrapped  in  a 
haze  of  red  and  brown.  This  touch  of  natural  magic  lent  a 
certain  solemnity  to  the  moment.  The  young  man's  free  and 
eager  action,  and,  above  all,  the  throbbing  of  his  surging 
heart,  whose  hurried  beating  spoke  to  Emilie's  arm,  stirred 
her  to  an  emotion  that  was  all  the  more  disturbing  because  it 
was  produced  by  the  simplest  and  most  innocent  circum- 
stances. The  restraint  under  which  young  girls  of  the  upper 
class  live  gives  incredible  force  to  any  explosion  of  feeling, 
and  to  meet  an  impassioned  lover  is  one  of  the  greatest 


324  THE   SCEAUX  BALL. 

dangers  they  can  encounter.  Never  had  Emilie  and  Maxi- 
milien  allowed  their  eyes  to  say  so  much  that  they  dared  never 
speak.  Carried  away  by  this  intoxication,  they  easily  forgot 
the  petty  stipulations  of  pride,  and  the  cold  hesitancies  of 
suspicion.  At  first,  indeed,  they  could  only  express  them- 
selves by  a  pressure  of  hands  which  interpreted  their  happy 
thoughts. 

After  slowly  pacing  a  few  steps  in  long  silence,  Mademoi- 
selle de  Fontaine  spoke.  "  Monsieur,  I  have  a  question  to 
ask  you,"  she  said,  trembling  and  in  an  agitated  voice. 
"But,  remember,  I  beg,  that  it  is  in  a  manner  compulsory  on 
me,  from  the  rather  singular  position  I  am  in  with  regard  to 
my  family." 

A  pause,  terrible  to  Emilie,  followed  these  sentences,  which 
she  had  almost  stammered  out.  During  the  minute  while  it 
lasted,  the  girl,  haughty  as  she  was,  dared  not  meet  the  flash- 
ing eye  of  the  man  she  loved,  for  she  was  secretly  conscious 
of  the  meanness  of  the  next  words  she  added:  "  Are  you  of 
noble  birth?" 

As  soon  as  the  words  were  spoken  she  wished  herself  at  the 
bottom  of  a  lake. 

"  Mademoiselle,"  Longueville  gravely  replied,  and  his  face 
assumed  a  sort  cf  stern  dignity,  "  I  promise  to  answer  you 
truly  as  soon  as  you  shall  have  answered  in  all  sincerity  a 
question  I  will  put  to  you  !  "  He  released  her  arm,  and  the 
girl  suddenly  felt  alone  in  the  world,  as  he  said:  "What  is 
your  object  in  questioning  me  as  to  my  birth  ?  " 

She  stood  motionless,  cold,  and  speechless. 

"  Mademoiselle,"  Maximilien  went  on,  "let  us  go  no  fur- 
ther if  we  do  not  understand  each  other.  I  love  you,"  he 
said,  in  a  voice  of  deep  emotion.  "Well,  then,"  he  added, 
as  he  heard  the  joyful  exclamation  she  could  not  suppress, 
"  why  ask  me  if  I  am  of  noble  birth  ?  " 

"  Could  he  speak  so  if  he  were  not?  "  cried  a  voice  within 
her,  which  Emilie  believed  came  from  the  depths  of  her 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  325 

heart.  She  gracefully  raised  her  head,  seemed  to  find  new 
life  in  the  young  man's  gaze,  and  held  out  her  hand  as  if  to 
renew  the  alliance. 

"You  thought  I  cared  very  much  for  dignities?"  said  she 
with  keen  archness. 

"I  have  no  titles  to  offer  my  wife,"  he  replied,  in  a  half- 
sportive,  half-serious  tone.  "But  if  I  choose  one  of  high 
rank,  and  among  women  whom  a  wealthy  home  has  accus- 
tomed to  the  luxury  and  pleasures  of  a  fine  fortune,  I  know 
what  such  a  choice  requires  of  me.  Love  gives  everything," 
he  added  lightly,  "  but  only  to  lovers.  Once  married,  they 
need  something  more  than  the  vault  of  heaven  and  the  carpet 
of  a  meadow." 

"He  is  rich,"  she  reflected.  "As  to  titles,  perhaps  he 
only  wants  to  try  me.  He  has  been  told  that  I  am  mad  about 
titles,  and  bent  on  marrying  none  but  a  peer's  son.  My 
priggish  sisters  have  played  me  that  trick.  I  assure  you, 
monsieur,"  she  said  aloud,  "  that  I  have  had  very  extravagant 
ideas  about  life  and  the  world;  but  now,"  she  added  point- 
edly, looking  at  him  in  a  perfectly  distracting  way,  "I  know 
where  true  riches  are  to  be  found  for  a  wife." 

"  I  must  believe  that  you  are  speaking  from  the  depths  of 
your  heart,"  he  said,  with  gentle  gravity.  "But  this  winter, 
my  dear  Emilie,  in  less  than  two  months  perhaps,  I  may  be 
proud  of  what  I  shall  have  to  offer  you  if  you  care  for  the 
pleasures  of  wealth.  This  is  the  only  secret  I  shall  keep 
locked  here,"  and  he  laid  his  hand  on  his  heart,  "  for  on  its 
success  my  happiness  depends.  I  dare  not  say  ours." 

"Yes,  yes,  ours  !  " 

Exchanging  such  sweet  nothings,  they  slowly  made  their 
way  back  to  rejoin  the  company.  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine 
had  never  found  her  lover  more  amiable  or  wittier;  his  light 
figure,  his  engaging  manners,  seemed  to  her  more  charming 
than  ever,  since  the  conversation  which  had  made  her  to  some 
extent  the  possessor  of  a  heart  worthy  to  be  the  envy  of  every 


326  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

woman.  They  sang  an  Italian  duet  with  so  much  expression 
that  the  audience  applauded  enthusiastically.  Their  adieux 
were  in  a  conventional  tone,  which  concealed  their  happiness. 
In  short,  this  day  had  been  to  Emilie  like  a  chain  binding  her 
more  closely  than  ever  to  the  stranger's  fate.  The  strength 
and  dignity  he  had  displayed  in  the  scene  when  they  had  con- 
fessed their  feelings  had  perhaps  impressed  Mademoiselle  de 
Fontaine  with  the  respect  without  which  there  is  no  true  love. 

When  she  was  left  alone  in  the  drawing-room  with  her 
father,  the  old  man  went  up  to  her  affectionately,  held  her 
hands,  and  asked  her  whether  she  had  gained  any  light  as  to 
Monsieur  Longueville's  family  and  fortune. 

"Yes,  my  dear  father,"  she  replied,  "and  I  am  happier 
than  I  could  hope.  In  short,  Monsieur  de  Longueville  is  the 
only  man  I  could  ever  marry." 

"Very  well,  Emilie,"  said  the  count,  "then  I  know  what 
remains  for  me  to  do." 

"  Do  you  know  of  any  impediment  ?  "  she  asked,  in  sincere 
alarm. 

"  My  dear  child,  the  young  man  is  totally  unknown  to  me ; 
but  unless  he  is  not  a  man  of  honor,  so  long  as  you  love  him, 
he  is  as  dear  to  me  as  a  son." 

"  Not  a  man  of  honor  !  "  exclaimed  Emilie.  "  As  to  that, 
I  am  quite  easy.  My  uncle,  who  introduced  him  to  us,  will 
answer  for  him.  Say,  my  dear  uncle,  has  he  been  a  filibuster, 
an  outlaw,  a  pirate?" 

"  I  knew  I  should  find  myself  in  this  fix  !  "  cried  the  old 
sailor,  waking  up.  He  looked  round  the  room,  but  his  niece 
had  vanished  "like  Saint-Elmo's  fires,"  to  use  his  favorite 
expression. 

"  Well,  uncle,"  Monsieur  de  Fontaine  went  on,  "  how 
could  you  hide  from  us  all  you  knew  about  this  young  man  ? 
You  must  have  seen  how  anxious  we  have  been.  Is  Monsieur 
de  Longueville  a  man  of  family?" 

"  I  don't  know  him  from  Adam  or  Eve,"  said  the  Comte 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  327 

de  Kergarouet.  "Trusting  to  that  crazy  child's  tact,  I  got 
him  here  by  a  method  of  my  own.  I  know  that  the  boy 
shoots  with  a  pistol  to  admiration,  hunts  well,  plays  wonder- 
fully at  billiards,  at  chess,  and  at  backgammon ;  he  handles 
the  foils,  and  rides  a  horse  like  the  late  Chevalier  de  Saint- 
Georges.  He  has  a  thorough  knowledge  of  all  our  vintages. 
He  is  as  good  an  arithmetician  as  Bareme,  draws,  dances,  and 
sings  well.  The  devil's  in  it  !  what  more  do  you  want  ?  If 
that  is  not  a  perfect  gentleman,  find  me  a  bourgeois  who 
knows  all  this,  or  any  man  who  lives  more  nobly  than  he 
does.  Does  he  do  anything,  I  ask  you  ?  Does  he  compro- 
mise his  dignity  by  hanging  about  an  office,  bowing  down 
before  the  upstarts  you  call  directors-general  ?  He  walks  up- 
right. He  is  a  man.  However,  I  have  just  found  in  my  vest 
pocket  the  card  he  gave  when  he  fancied  I  wanted  to  cut  his 
throat,  poor  innocent.  Young  men  are  very  simple-minded 
nowadays!  Here  it  is." 

"Rue  du  Sentier,  No.  5,"  said  Monsieur  de  Fontaine,  try- 
ing to  recall,  among  all  the  information  he  had  received, 
something  which  might  concern  the  stranger.  "  What  the 
devil  can  it  mean  ?  Messrs.  Palma,  Werbrust  &  Co.,  whole- 
sale dealers  in  muslins,  calicoes,  and  printed  cotton  goods, 
live  there.  Stay,  I  have  it :  Longueville  the  deputy  has  an 
interest  in  their  house.  Well,  but  so  far  as  I  know,  Longue- 
ville has  but  one  son  of  two-and-thirty,  who  is  not  at  all  like 
our  man,  and  to  whom  he  gave  fifty  thousand  francs  a  year 
that  he  might  marry  a  minister's  daughter;  he  wants  to  be 
made  a  peer  like  the  rest  of  *em.  I  never  heard  him  mention 
this  Maximilien.  Has  he  a  daughter?  What  is  this  girl 
Clara  ?  Beside,  it  is  open  to  any  adventurer  to  call  himself 
Longueville.  But  is  not  the  house  of  Palma,  Werbrust  &  Co. 
half  ruined  by  some  speculation  in  Mexico  or  the  Indies  ?  I 
will  clear  all  this  up." 

"You  speak  a  soliloquy  as  if  you  were  on  the  stage,  and 
seem  to  account  me  a  cypher,"  said  the  old  admiral  suddenly. 


328  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

"  Don't  you  know  that  if  he  is  a  gentleman,  I  have  more 
than  one  bag  in  my  hold  that  will  stop  any  leak  in  his  for- 
tune ?" 

"  As  to  that,  if  he  is  a  son  of  Longueville's,  he  will  want 
nothing;  but,"  said  Monsieur  de  Fontaine,  shaking  his  head 
from  side  to  side,  "  his  father  has  not  even  washed  off  the 
stains  of  his  origin.  Before  the  Revolution  he  was  an  at- 
torney, and  the  de  he  has  since  assumed  no  more  belongs  to 
him  than  half  of  his  fortune." 

"  Pooh  !  pooh  !  happy  those  whose  fathers  were  hanged  !  " 
cried  the  admiral  gayly. 

Three  or  four  days  after  this  memorable  day,  on  one  of 
those  fine  mornings  in  the  month  of  November,  which  show 
the  boulevards  cleaned  by  the  sharp  cold  of  an  early  frost, 
Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine,  wrapped  in  a  new  style  of  fur 
cape,  of  which  she  wished  to  set  the  fashion,  went  out  with 
two  of  her  sisters-in-law,  on  whom  she  had  been  wont  to  dis- 
charge her  most  cutting  remarks.  The  three  women  were 
tempted  to  the  drive,  less  by  their  desire  to  try  a  very  elegant 
carriage,  and  wear  gowns  which  were  to  set  the  fashions  for 
the  winter,  than  by  their  wish  to  see  a  cape  which  a  friend 
had  observed  in  a  handsome  lace  and  linen  store  at  the  corner 
of  the  Rue  de  la  Paix.  As  soon  as  they  were  in  the  store  the 
Baronne  de  Fontaine  pulled  Emilie  by  the  sleeve,  and  pointed 
out  to  her  Maximilien  Longueville  seated  behind  the  desk, 
and  engaged  in  paying  out  the  change  for  a  gold-piece  to  one 
of  the  workwomen  with  whom  he  seemed  to  be  in  consulta- 
tion. The  "  handsome  stranger  "  held  in  his  hand  a  parcel 
'of  patterns,  which  left  no  doubt  as  to  his  honorable  profession. 

Emilie  felt  an  icy  shudder,  though  no  one  perceived  it. 
Thanks  to  the  good  breeding  of  the  best  society,  she  com- 
pletely concealed  the  rage  in  her  heart,  and  answered  her 
sister-in-law  with  the  words,  "I  knew  it,"  with  a  fullness  of 
intonation  and  inimitable  decision  which  the  most  famous 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  329 

actress  of  the  time  might  have  envied  her.  She  went  straight 
up  to  the  desk.  Longueville  looked  up,  put  the  patterns  in 
his  pocket  with  distracting  coolness,  bowed  to  Mademoiselle 
de  Fontaine,  and  came  forward,  looking  at  her  keenly. 

"  Mademoiselle,"  he  said  to  the  shopgirl,  who  followed 
him,  looking  very  much  disturbed,  "  I  will  send  to  settle  that 
account;  my  house  deals  in  that  way.  But  here,"  he  whis- 
pered into  her  ear,  as  he  gave  her  a  thousand-franc  note, 
"  take  this — it  is  between  ourselves.  You  will  forgive  me,  I 
trust,  mademoiselle,"  he  added,  turning  to  Emilie.  "You 
will  kindly  excuse  the  tyranny  of  business  matters." 

"  Indeed,  monsieur,  it  seems  to  me  that  it  is  no  concern  of 
mine,"  replied  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine,  looking  at  him 
with  a  bold  expression  of  sarcastic  indifference  which  might 
have  made  any  one  believe  that  she  now  saw  him  for  the  first 
time. 

"Do  you  really  mean  it?"  asked  Maximilien  in  a  broken 
voice. 

Emilie  turned  her  back  upon  him  with  amazing  insolence. 
These  few  words,  spoken  in  an  undertone,  had  escaped  the 
ears  of  her  two  sisters-in-law.  When,  after  buying  the  cape, 
the  three  ladies  got  into  the  carriage  again,  Emilie,  seated 
with  her  back  to  the  horses,  could  not  resist  one  last  compre- 
hensive glance  into  the  depths  of  the  odious  store,  where  she 
saw  Maximilien  standing  with  his  arms  folded,  in  the  attitude 
of  a  man  superior  to  the  disaster  that  had  so  suddenly  fallen 
on  him.  Their  eyes  met  and  flashed  implacable  looks.  Each 
hoped  to  inflict  a  cruel  wound  on  the  heart  of  a  lover.  In 
one  instant  they  were  as  far  apart  as  if  one  had  been  in  China 
and  the  other  in  Greenland. 

Does  not  the  breath  of  vanity  wither  everything?  Made- 
moiselle  de  Fontaine,  a  prey  to  the  most  violent  struggle  that 
can  torture  the  heart  of  a  young  girl,  reaped  the  richest  har- 
vest of  anguish  that  prejudice  and  narrow-mindedness  ever 
sowed  in  a  human  soul.  Her  face,  but  just  now  fresh  and 


330  THE  SCEAUX  BALL, 

velvety,  was  streaked  with  yellow  lines  and  red  patches ;  the 
paleness  of  her  cheeks  seemed  every  now  and  then  to  turn 
green.  Hoping  to  hide  her  despair  from  ner  sisters,  she 
would  laugh  as  she  pointed  out  some  ridiculous  dress  or 
passer-by;  but  her  laughter  was  spasmodic.  She  was  more 
deeply  hurt  by  their  unspoken  compassion  than  by  any  satirical 
comments  for  which  she  might  have  revenged  herself.  She 
exhausted  her  wit  in  trying  to  engage  them  in  a  conversation, 
in  which  she  tried  to  expend  her  fury  in  senseless  paradoxes, 
heaping  on  all  men  engaged  in  trade  the  bitterest  insults  and 
witticisms  in  the  worst  taste. 

On  getting  home,  she  had  an  attack  of  fever,  which  at  first 
assumed  a  somewhat  serious  character.  By  the  end  of  a 
month  the  care  of  her  parents  and  of  the  physician  restored 
her  to  her  family. 

Every  one  hoped  that  this  lesson  would  be  severe  enough  to 
subdue  Emilie's  nature ;  but  she  insensibly  fell  into  her  old 
habits  and  threw  herself  again  into  the  world  of  fashion.  She 
declared  that  there  was  no  disgrace  in  making  a  mistake.  If 
she,  like  her  father,  had  a  vote  in  the  Chamber,  she  would  move 
for  an  edict,  she  said,  by  which  all  merchants,  and  especially 
dealers  in  calico,  should  be  branded  on  the  forehead,  like 
Berri  sheep,  down  to  the  third  generation.  She  wished  that 
none  but  nobles  should  have  a  right  to  wear  the  antique 
French  costume,  which  was  so  becoming  to  the  courtiers  of 
Louis  XV.  To  hear  her,  it  was  a  misfortune  for  France, 
perhaps,  that  there  was  no  outward  and  visible  difference 
between  a  merchant  and  a  peer  of  France.  And  a  hundred 
more  such  pleasantries,  easy  to  imagine,  were  rapidly  poured 
out  when  any  accident  brought  up  the  subject. 

But  those  who  loved  Emilie  could  see  through  all  her  banter 
a  tinge  of  melancholy.  It  was  clear  that  Maximilien  Longue- 
ville  still  reigned  over  that  inexorable  heart.  Sometimes  she 
would  be  as  gentle  as  she  had  been  during  the  brief  summer 
that  had  seen  the  birth  of  her  love;  sometimes,  again,  she 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL,  331 

was  unendurable.  Every  one  made  excuses  for  her  inequality 
of  temper,  which  had  its  source  in  sufferings  at  once  secret 
and  known  to  all.  The  Comte  de  Kergarouet  had  some 
influence  over  her,  thanks  to  his  increased  prodigality,  a  kind 
of  consolation  which  rarely  fails  of  its  effect  on  a  Parisian 
girl. 

The  first  ball  at  which  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  appeared 
was  at  the  Neapolitan  ambassador's.  As  she  took  her  place 
in  the  first  quadrille  she  saw,  a  few  yards  away  from  her, 
Maximilien  Longueville,  who  nodded  slightly  to  her  partner. 

"Is  that  young  man  a  friend  of  yours?"  she  asked,  with 
a  scornful  air. 

"Only  my  brother,"  he  replied. 

Emilie  could  not  help  starting.  "Ah!"  he  continued, 
"and  he  is  the  noblest  soul  living " 

"Do  you  know  my  name?"  asked  Emilie,  eagerly  inter- 
rupting him. 

"  No,  mademoiselle.  It  is  a  crime,  I  confess,  not  to  remem- 
ber a  name  which  is  on  every  lip — I  ought  to  say  in  every 
heart.  But  I  have  a  valid  excuse.  I  have  but  just  arrived 
from  Germany.  My  ambassador,  who  is  in  Paris  on  leave, 
sent  me  here  this  evening  to  take  care  of  his  amiable  wife, 
whom  you  may  see  yonder  in  that  corner." 

"  A  perfect  tragic  mask  !  "  said  Emilie,  after  looking  at  the 
ambassadress. 

"  And  yet  that  is  her  ballroom  face  !  "  said  the  young  man, 
laughing.  "  I  shall  have  to  dance  with  her !  So  I  thought  I 
might  have  some  compensation."  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine 
curtsied.  "  I  was  very  much  surprised,"  the  voluble  young 
secretary  went  on,  "to  find  my  brother  here.  On  arriving 
from  Vienna  I  heard  that  the  poor  boy  was  ill  in  bed,  and  i 
counted  on  seeing  him  before  coming  to  this  ball  ;  but  good 
policy  will  not  always  allow  us  to  indulge  family  affection. 
The  Padrona  della  casa  (or  lady  in  the  case)  would  not  give 
me  time  to  call  on  my  poor  Maximilien." 


332  THE   SCEAUX  BALL. 

"  Then,  monsieur,  your  brother  is  not,  like  you,  in  diplo- 
matic employment." 

"No,"  said  the  attache,  with  a  sigh,  "the  poor  fellow 
sacrificed  himself  for  me.  He  and  my  sister  Clara  have 
renounced  their  share  of  my  father's  fortune  to  make  an  eldest 
son  of  me.  My  father  dreams  of  a  peerage,  like  all  who  vote 
for  the  Ministry.  Indeed,  it  is  promised  him,"  he  added  in 
an  undertone.  "  After  saving  up  a  little  capital  my  brother 
joined  a  banking  firm,  and  I  hear  he  has  just  effected  a  specu- 
lation in  Brazil  which  may  make  him  a  millionaire.  You  see 
me  in  the  highest  spirits  at  having  been  able,  by  my  diplo- 
matic connections,  to  contribute  to  his  success.  I  am  impa- 
tiently expecting  a  dispatch  from  the  Brazilian  Legation,  which 
will  help  to  lift  the  cloud  from  his  brow.  What  do  you  think 
of  him?" 

"  Well,  your  brother's  face  does  not  look  to  me  like  that  of 
a  man  busied  with  money  matters." 

The  young  attache  shot  a  scrutinizing  glance  at  the  ap- 
parently calm  face  of  his  partner. 

"What!  "  he  exclaimed,  with  a  smile,  "can  young  ladies 
read  the  thoughts  of  love  behind  a  silent  brow  ?  " 

"Your  brother  is  in  love,  then?"  she  asked,  betrayed  into 
a  movement  of  curiosity. 

"Yes;  my  sister  Clara,  to  whom  he  is  as  devoted  as  a 
mother,  wrote  to  me  that  he  had  fallen  in  love  this  summer 
with  a  very  pretty  girl ;  but  I  have  had  no  further  news  of 
the  affair.  Would  you  believe  that  the  poor  boy  used  to  get 
up  at  five  in  the  morning,  and  went  off  to  settle  his  business 
that  he  might  be  back  by  four  o'clock  in  the  country  where 
the  lady  was  ?  In  fact,  he  ruined  a  very  nice  thoroughbred 
that  I  had  given  him.  Forgive  my  chatter,  mademoiselle  ;  I 
have  but  just  come  home  from  Germany.  For  a  year  I  have 
heard  no  decent  French,  I  have  been  weaned  from  French 
faces,  and  satiated  with  horrid  Germans,  to  such  a  degree 
that,  I  believe,  in  my  patriotic  mania,  I  could  talk  to  the 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  33', 

chimeras  on  a  French  candlestick.  And  if  I  talk  with  a  lack 
of  reserve  unbecoming  in  a  diplomatist,  the  fault  is  yours, 
mademoiselle.  Was  it  not  you  who  pointed  out  my  brother? 
When  he  is  the  theme  I  become  inexhaustible.  I  should  like 
to  proclaim  to  all  the  world  how  good  and  generous  he  is. 
He  gave  up  no  less  than  a  hundred  thousand  francs  a  year, 
the  income  from  the  Longueville  property." 

If  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  had  the  benefit  of  these  im- 
portant revelations,  it  was  partly  due  to  the  skill  with  which 
she  continued  to  question  her  confiding  partner  from  the 
moment  when  she  found  that  he  was  the  brother  of  her  scorned 
lover. 

"And  could  you,  without  being  grieved,  see  your  brother 
selling  muslin  and  calico?"  asked  Emilie,  at  the  end  of  the 
third  figure  of  the  quadrille. 

"  How  do  you  know  that?"  asked  the  attache".  "Thank 
God,  though  I  pour  out  a  flood  of  words,  I  have  already  ac- 
quired the  art  of  not  telling  more  than  I  intend,  like  all  the 
other  diplomatic  cadets  I  know." 

"You  told  me,  I  assure  you." 

Monsieur  de  Longueville  looked  at  Mademoiselle  de  Fon- 
taine with  a  surprise  that  was  full  of  perspicacity.  A  suspi- 
cion flashed  upon  him.  He  glanced  inquiringly  from  his 
brother  to  his  partner,  guessed  everything,  clasped  his  hands, 
fixed  his  eyes  on  the  ceiling,  and  began  to  laugh,  saying,  "  I 
am  an  idiot!  You  are  the  handsomest  person  here;  my 
brother  keeps  stealing  glances  at  you ;  he  is  dancing  in  spite 
of  his  illness,  and  you  pretend  not  to  see  him.  Make  him 
happy,"  he  added,  as  he  led  her  back  to  her  old  uncle.  "  I 
shall  not  be  jealous,  but  I  shall  always  shiver  a  little  at  calling 
you  my  sister " 

The  lovers,  however,  were  to  prove  as  inexorable  to  each 
other  as  they  were  to  themselves.  At  about  two  in  the  morn- 
ins?  refreshments  were  served  in  an  immense  corridor,  where, 
to^leave  persons  of  the  same  coterie  free  to  meet  each  other, 


334  THE   SCEAUX  BALL. 

the  tables  were  arranged  as  in  a  restaurant.  By  one  of  those 
accidents  which  always  happen  to  lovers,  Mademoiselle  de 
Fontaine  found  herself  at  a  table  next  to  that  at  which  the 
more  important  guests  were  seated.  Maximilien  was  one  of 
the  group.  Emilie,  who  lent  an  attentive  ear  to  her  neighbors' 
conversation,  overheard  one  of  those  dialogues  into  which  a 
young  woman  so  easily  falls  with  a  young  man  who  has 
the  grace  and  style  of  Maximilien  Longueville.  The  lady 
talking  to  the  young  banker  was  a  Neapolitan  duchess,  whose 
eyes  shot  lightning  flashes,  and  whose  skin  had  the  sheen  of 
satin.  The  intimate  terms  on  which  Longueville  affected  to 
be  with  her  stung  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  all  the  more  be- 
cause she  had  just  given  her  lover  back  twenty  times  as  much 
tenderness  as  she  had  ever  felt  for  him  before. 

"  Yes,  monsieur,  in  my  country  true  love  can  make  every 
kind  of  sacrifice,"  the  duchess  was  saying,  with  a  simper. 

"You  have  more  passion  than  Frenchwomen,"  said  Maxi- 
milien, whose  burning  gaze  fell  on  Emilie.  "  They  are  all 
vanity." 

"Monsieur,"  Emilie  eagerly  interposed,  "is  it  not  very 
wrong  to  calumniate  your  own  country  ?  Devotion  is  to  be 
found  in  every  nation." 

"Do  you  imagine,  mademoiselle,"  retorted  the  Italian, 
with  a  sardonic  smile,  "that  a  Parisian  would  be  capable  of 
following  her  lover  all  over  the  world  ?  " 

"  Oh,  madame,  let  us  understand  each  other.  She  would 
follow  him  to  a  desert  and  live  in  a  tent,  but  not  to  sit  in 
a  store." 

A  disdainful  gesture  completed  her  meaning.  Thus,  under 
the  influence  of  her  disastrous  education,  Emilie  for  the  second 
time  killed  her  budding  happiness  and  destroyed  its  prospects 
of  life.  Maximilien's  apparent  indifference,  and  a  woman's 
smile,  had  wrung  from  her  one  of  those  sarcasms  whose 
treacherous  zest  always  led  her  astray. 

"Mademoiselle,"  said  Longueville,  in  a  low  voice,  under 


THE  SCEAUX  fiALL.  333 

cover  of  the  noise  made  by  the  ladies  as  they  rose  from  the 
table,  "  no  one  will  ever  more  ardently  desire  your  happiness 
than  I ;  permit  me  to  assure  you  of  this,  as  I  am  taking  leave 
of  you.  I  am  starting  for  Italy  in  a  few  days." 

"  With  a  duchess,  no  doubt  ?  " 

"  No,  but  perhaps  with  a  mortal  blow." 

"Is  not  that  pure  fancy?"  asked  Emilie,  with  an  anxious 
glance. 

"  No,"  he  replied.    "  There  are  wounds  which  never  heal." 

"You  are  not  to  go,"  said  the  girl  imperiously,  and  she 
smiled. 

"I  shall  go,"  replied  Maximilien,  gravely. 

"  You  will  find  me  married  on  your  return,  I  warn  you," 
she  said  coquettishly. 

"I  hope  so." 

"Impertinent  wretch!"  she  exclaimed.  "How  cruel  a 
revenge !  " 

A  fortnight  later  Maximilien  set  out  with  his  sister  Clara 
for  the  warm  and  poetic  scenes  of  beautiful  Italy,  leaving 
Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  a  prey  to  the  most  vehement  regret. 
The  young  secretary  to  the  Embassy  took  up  his  brother's 
quarrel,  and  contrived  to  take  signal  vengeance  on  Emilie's 
disdain  by  making  known  the  occasion  of  the  lovers'  separa- 
tion. He  repaid  his  fair  partner  with  interest  all  the  sarcasm 
with  which  she  had  formerly  attacked  Maximilien,  and  often 
made  more  than  one  excellency  smile  by  describing  the  fair 
foe  of  the  counting-house,  the  amazon  who  preached  a  crusade 
against  bankers,  the  young  girl  whose  love  had  evaporated 
before  a  bale  of  muslin.  The  Comte  de  Fontaine  was  obliged 
to  use  his  influence  to  procure  an  appointment  to  Russia  for 
Auguste  Longueville  in  order  to  protect  his  daughter  from 
the  ridicule  heaped  upon  her  by  this  dangerous  young  perse- 
cutor. 

Not  long  after,  the  Ministry  being  compelled  to  raise  a  levy 


336  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

of  peers  to  support  the  aristocratic  party,  trembling  in  the 
Upper  Chamber  under  the  lash  of  an  illustrious  writer,  gave 
Monsieur  Guiraudin  de  Longueville  a  peerage,  with  the  title 
of  Vicomte.  Monsieur  de  Fontaine  also  obtained  a  peerage, 
the  reward  due  as  much  to  his  fidelity  in  evil  days  as  to  his 
name,  which  claimed  a  place  in  the  hereditary  Chamber. 

About  this  time  Emilie,  now  of  age,  made,  no  doubt,  some 
serious  reflections  on  life,  for  her  tone  and  manners  changed 
perceptibly.  Instead  of  amusing  herself  by  saying  spiteful 
things  to  her  uncle,  she  lavished  on  him  the  most  affectionate 
attentions ;  she  brought  him  his  stick  with  a  persevering  de- 
votion that  made  the  cynic  smile,  she  gave  him  her  arm,  rode 
in  his  carriage,  and  accompanied  him  in  all  his  drives ;  she 
even  persuaded  him  that  she  liked  the  smell  of  tobacco,  and 
read  him  his  favorite  paper  "La  Quotidienne  "  in  the  midst 
of  clouds  of  smoke,  which  the  malicious  old  sailor  inten- 
tionally blew  over  her ;  she  learned  piquet  to  be  a  match  for 
the  old  count ;  and  this  fantastic  damsel  even  listened  without 
impatience  to  his  periodical  narratives  of  the  battles  of  the 
Belle-Poule,  the  manoeuvres  of  the  Ville  de  Paris,  M.  de 
Suffren's  first  expedition,  or  the  battle  of  Aboukir. 

Though  the  old  sailor  had  often  said  that  he  knew  his  longi- 
tude and  latitude  too  well  to  allow  himself  to  be  captured  by  a 
young  corvette,  one  fine  morning  Paris  drawing-rooms  heard 
the  news  of -the  marriage  of  Mademoiselle  de  Fontaine  to  the 
Comte  de  Kergarouet.  The  young  comtesse  gave  splendid 
entertainments  to  drown  thought ;  but  she,  no  doubt,  found  a 
void  at  the  bottom  of  the  whirlpool :  luxury  was  ineffectual  to 
disguise  the  emptiness  and  grief  of  her  sorrowing  soul ;  for  the 
most  part,  in  spite  of  the  flashes  of  assumed  gayety,  her  beauti- 
ful face  expressed  unspoken  melancholy.  Emilie  appeared, 
however,  full  of  attentions  and  consideration  for  her  old  hus- 
band, who,  on  retiring  to  his  rooms  at  night,  to  the  sounds  of 
a  lively  band,  would  often  say,  "  I  do  not  know  myself.  Was 
I  to  wait  till  the  age  of  seventy-two  to  embark  as  a  pilot  on 


THE  SCEAUX  BALL.  337 

board  the  Belle  Emilie  after  twenty  years  of  matrimonial 
galleys?" 

The  conduct  of  the  young  comtesse  was  marked  by  such 
strictness  that  the  most  clear-sighted  criticism  had  no  fault  to 
find  with  her.  Lookers-on  chose  to  think  that  the  vice-ad- 
miral had  reserved  the  right  of  disposing  of  his  fortune  to  keep 
his  wife  more  tightly  in  hand ;  but  this  was  a  notion  as  insult- 
ing to  the  uncle  as  to  the  niece.  Their  conduct  was  indeed  so 
delicately  judicious  that  the  men  who  were  most  interested  in 
guessing  the  secrets  of  the  couple  could  never  decide  whether 
the  old  count  regarded  her  as  a  wife  or  as  a  daughter.  He 
was  often  heard  to  say  that  he  had  rescued  his  niece  as  a  cast- 
away after  shipwreck  ;  and  that,  for  his  part,  he  had  never 
taken  a  mean  advantage  of  hospitality  when  he  had  saved  an 
enemy  from  the  fury  of  the  storm.  Though  the  comtesse 
aspired  to  reign  in  Paris  and  tried  to  keep  pace  with  Mes- 
dames  the  Duchesses  de  Maufrigneuse  and  de  Chaulieu,  the 
Marquises  d'Espard  and  d'Aiglemont,  the  Comtesses  Feraud, 
de  Montcornet,  and  de  Restaud,  Madame  de  Camps,  and 
Mademoiselle  des  Touches,  she  did  not  yield  to  the  addresses 
of  the  young  Vicomte  de  Portenduere,  who  made  her  his  idol. 

Two  years  after  her  marriage,  in  one  of  the  old  drawing- 
rooms  in  the  Faubourg  Saint-Germain,  where  she  was  admired 
for  her  character,  worthy  of  the  old  school,  Emilie  heard  the 
Vicomte  de  Longueville  announced.  In  the  corner  of  the 
room  where  she  was  sitting,  playing  piquet  with  the  Bishop  of 
Persepolis,  her  agitation  was  not  observed;  she  turned  her 
head  and  saw  her  former  lover  come  in,  in  all  the  freshness  of 
youth.  His  father's  death,  and  then  that  of  his  brother, 
killed  by  the  severe  climate  of  St.  Petersburg,  had  placed  on 
Maximilien's  head  the  hereditary  plumes  of  the  French  peer's 
coronet.  His  fortune  matched  his  learning  and  his  merits  ; 
only  the  day  before  his  youthful  and  fervid  eloquence  had 
dazzled  the  Assembly.  At  this  moment  he  stood  before  the 
comtesse,  free,  and  graced  with  all  the  advantages  she  had 
22 


338  THE  SCEAUX  BALL. 

formerly  required  of  her  ideal.  Every  mother  with  a  daughter 
to  marry  made  amiable  advances  to  a  man  gifted  with  the 
virtues  which  they  attributed  to  him,  as  they  admired  his  at- 
tractive person ;  but  Emilie  knew,  better  than  any  one,  that 
the  Vicomte  de  Longueville  had  the  steadfast  nature  in  which 
a  wise  woman  sees  a  guarantee  of  happiness.  She  looked  at 
the  admiral,  who,  to  use  his  favorite  expression,  seemed  likely 
to  hold  his  course  for  a  long  time  yet,  and  cursed  the  follies 
of  her  youth. 

At  this  moment  Monsieur  de  Persepolis  said  with  episcopal 
grace:  "Fair  lady,  you  have  thrown  away  the  king  of  hearts 
— I  have  won.  But  do  not  regret  your  money.  I  keep  it  for 
my  little  seminariens." 

PARIS,  December,  1829. 


THE  UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS 

(Les  Comcdiens  sans  le  s avoir). 

Translated   by  ELLEN    MARRIAGK. 

To  M.  le  Comte  Jules  de  Castellane. 

LEON  DE  LORA,  the  famous  French  landscape  painter, 
belongs  to  one  of  the  noblest  families  of  Roussillon.  The 
Loras  came  originally  from  Spain  ;  and  while  they  are  dis- 
tinguished for  their  ancient  lineage,  for  the  last  century  they 
have  faithfully  kept  up  the  traditions  of  the  hidalgo's  pro- 
verbial poverty.  Leon  himself  came  up  to  Paris  on  foot  from 
his  department  of  the  Eastern  Pyrenees  with  the  sum  of  eleven 
francs  in  his  pocket  for  all  viaticum ;  and  in  some  sort  forgot 
the  hardships  of  childhood  and  the  poverty  at  home  in  the 
later  hardships  which  a  young  dauber  never  lacks  when  his 
whole  fortune  consists  in  an  intrepid  vocation.  Afterward 
the  absorbing  cares  brought  by  fame  and  success  still  further 
helped  him  to  forget. 

If  you  have  followed  the  tortuous  and  capricious  course  of 
these  Studies,  you  may  perhaps  recollect  one  of  the  heroes  of 
"Un  Debut  dans  la  vie,"*  Schinner's  pupil,  Mistigris,  who 
reappears  from  time  to  time  in  various  Scenes. 

You  would  not  recognize  the  frisky  penniless  dauber  in  the 
landscape  painter  of  1845,  the  rival  of  Hobbema,  Ruysdael, 
and  Claude  Lorrain.  Lora  is  a  great  man.  He  lives  near  his 
old  master  Hippolyte  Schinner  in  a  charming  house  (his  own 
property)  in  the  Rue  de  Berlin,  not  very  far  from  the  H6tel  de 
Brambourg,  where  his  friend  Bridau  lives.  He  is  a  member 
of  the  Institute  and  an  officer  of  the  Legion  of  Honor,  he 
has  twenty  thousand  francs  a  year,  his  work  fetches  its  weight 
in  gold;  and,  fact  even  more  extraordinary  (as  he  thinks) 

*  "A  Start  in  Life." 

(339) 


340  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

than  the  invitations  to  court  balls  which  he  sometimes  receives 
— the  fame  of  a  name  published  abroad  over  Europe  by  the 
press  for  the  last  sixteen  years  at  length  reached  the  valley  in 
the  Eastern  Pyrenees,  where  three  Loras  of  the  old  stock  were 
vegetating — to  wit,  his  elder  brother,  his  father,  and  a  paternal 
aunt,  Mile.  Urraca  y  Lora. 

On  the  mother's  side  no  relatives  remained  to  the  painter 
save  a  cousin,  aged  fifty,  living  in  a  little  manufacturing  town 
in  the  department,  but  that  cousin  was  the  first  to  remember 
Leon.  So  far  back  as  1840,  Leon  de  Lora  received  a  letter 
from  M.  Sylvestre  Palafox-Castel-Gazonal  (usually  known  as 
plain  Gazonal),  to  which  letter  Lora  replied  that  he  really 
was  himself — that  is  to  say,  that  he  really  was  the  son  of  the 
late  Leonie  Gazonal,  wife  of  Monsieur  the  Comte  Fernand 
Didas  y  Lora.* 

Upon  this,  in  the  summer  of  1841,  Cousin  Sylvestre  Gazo- 
nal went  to  apprise  the  illustrious  but  obscure  house  of  Lora 
of  the  fact  that  young  Leon  had  not  sailed  for  the  Plate 
River,  nor  was  he  dead,  as  they  supposed ;  but  he  was  one  of 
the  finest  geniuses  of  the  modern  French  school — which  they 
refused  to  believe.  The  elder  brother,  Don  Juan  de  Lora, 
told  his  Cousin  Gazonal  that  he,  Gazonal,  had  been  hoaxed  by 
some  Parisian  wag. 

Time  went  on,  and  the  said  Gazonal  found  himself  involved 
in  a  lawsuit,  which  the  prefect  of  the  Eastern  Pyrenees  sum- 
marily stopped  on  a  question  of  disputed  jurisdiction  and 
transferred  to  the  Council  of  State.  Gazonal  proposed  to 
himself  to  go  to  Paris  to  watch  his  case,  and  at  the  same  time 
to  clear  up  this  matter,  and  to  call  the  Parisian  painter  to 
account  for  his  impertinence.  To  this  end,  M.  Gazonal 
sallied  forth  from  his  furnished  lodging  in  the  Rue  Croix  des 
Petits  Champs,  and  was  astonished  at  the  sight  of  the  palace 
in  the  Rue  de  Berlin  ;  and,  learning  on  inquiry  that  its  owner 
was  traveling  in  Italy,  renounced  for  the  time  being  the  inten- 

*  In  Spain  the  mother's  surname  is  given  the  children. 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  341 

tion  of  asking  him  for  satisfaction.  His  mind  misgave  him 
whether  the  great  man  would  consent  to  own  his  mother's 
nephew. 

Through  1843  and  1844  Gazonal  followed  the  fortunes  of 
his  lawsuit.  The  local  authorities,  supported  by  the  riparian 
owners,  proposed  to  remove  a  weir  on  the  river.  The  very 
existence  of  Gazonal's  factory  was  threatened.  In  1845  ne 
looked  on  the  case  as  lost  beyond  hope.  The  secretary  of 
the  master  of  requests,  who  drew  up  the  report,  told  him  in 
confidence  that  it  was  unfavorable  to  his  claims,  and  his  own 
barrister  confirmed  the  news.  Gazonal,  at  home  a  com- 
mandant of  the  National  Guard,  and  as  shrewd  a  manufac- 
turer as  you  would  find  in  his  department,  in  Paris  felt  so 
utterly  insignificant,  and  found  the  cost  of  living  so  high,  that 
he  kept  close  in  his  shabby  lodging. 

The  child  of  the  South,  deprived  of  the  sun,  poured  male- 
dictions upon  Paris,  that  "rheumatism  factory,"  as  he  called 
it ;  and,  when  he  came  to  reckon  up  the  expenses  of  his  stay, 
vowed  to  himself  to  poison  the  prefect  or  to  "  minotaurise  "* 
him  on  his  return.  In  gloomier  moments  he  slew  the  prefect 
outright ;  then  he  cheered  up  a  little,  and  contented  himself 
with  "  minotaurising  "  the  culprit. 

One  morning  after  breakfast,  inwardly  storming,  he  snatched 
the  newspaper  up  savagely,  and  the  following  lines  caught  his 
eye  at  the  end  of  a  paragraph  :  "  Our  great  landscape  painter, 
Ldon  de  Lora,  returned  from  Italy  a  month  ago.  He  is  send- 
ing a  good  deal  of  his  work  to  the  Salon  this  year,  so  we  may 

look  forward  to  a  very  brilliant  exhibition "  The  words 

rang  in  Gazonal's  ears  like  the  inner  voice  which  tells  the 
gambler  that  he  will  win.  With  southern  impetuosity,  Gazo- 
nal dashed  out  of  the  house,  hailed  a  cab,  and  went  to  his 
cousin's  house  in  the  Rue  de  Berlin. 

Leon  de  Lora  happened  to  be  engaged  at  the  moment,  but 
he  sent  a  message  asking  his  relative  to  breakfast  with  him  the 
*  Chew  him  up :  from  Minotaure,  a  dragon-like  animal. 


342  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

next  day  at  tha  Cafe  de  Paris.  Gazonal,  like  a  man  of  the 
South,  poured  out  his  woes  to  the  valet. 

Next  morning,  overdressed  for  the  occasion  in  a  coat  of 
corn-cockle  blue,  with  gilt  buttons,  a  frilled  shirt,  white  vest, 
and  yellow  kid  gloves,  Gazonal  fidgeted  up  and  down  the 
boulevard  for  an  hour  and  a  half,  after  learning  from  the 
cafetier  (so  provincials  call  the  proprietor  of  a  cafe)  that  gen- 
tlemen usually  breakfasted  between  eleven  and  twelve. 

"About  half-past  eleven,"  so  he  used  to  tell  the  story  after- 
ward to  everybody  at  home,  "  two  Parisians  in  plain  surtouts, 
looking  like  nobodies,  came  along  the  boulevard,  and  cried  out 
as  soon  as-  they  saw  me,  '  Here  comes  your  Gazonal ! ' ' 

The  second  comer  was  Bixiou,  brought  on  purpose  to  "  draw 
out "  Leon's  cousin. 

"And  then,"  he  would  continue,  "  young  Leon  hugged  me 
in  his  arms  and  cried,  '  Do  not  be  cross,  dear  cousin ;  I  am 
very  much  yours.'  The  breakfast  was  sumptuous.  I  rubbed 
my  eyes  when  I  saw  so  many  gold-pieces  put  down  on  the 
bill.  These  fellows  must  be  making  their  weight  in  gold,  for 
my  cousin  gave  the  waiter  thirty  sols  (sous) — a  whole  day's 
wages !  " 

Over  that  monster  breakfast,  in  the  course  of  which  they 
consumed  six  dozen  Ostend  oysters,  half  a  dozen  cutlets  a  la 
Soubise,  a  chicken  a  la  Marengo,  a  lobster  mayonaise,  mush- 
rooms on  toast,  and  green  peas,  to  say  nothing  of  hors  t?  ceuvrcs 
(side-dishes),  washed  down  with  three  bottles  of  bordeaux, 
three  of  champagne,  several  cups  of  coffee  and  liqueurs,  Gazo- 
nal launched  forth  into  magnificent  invective  on  the  subject 
of  Paris.  The  noble  manufacturer  complained  of  the  length 
of  the  four-pound  loaves,  of  the  height  of  the  houses,  of  the 
callous  indifference  toward  each  other  displayed  by  the  passers- 
by,  of  the  cold,  of  the  rain,  of  the  fares  charged  by  the  "  demi- 
fiacres" — and  all  so  amusingly,  that  the  pair  of  artists  warmed 
toward  him  and  asked  for  the  story  of  his  lawsuit. 

"The  histor-r-ry  of  my  lawsuit,"  said  he,  rolling  his  r's 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  343 

and  accentuating  every  word  in  Provencal  fashion,  "  the  his- 
tor-r-ry  of  my  lawsuit  is  quite  simple.  They  want  my  factory. 
I  find  a  fool  of  a  barrister,  I  give  him  twenty  francs  every 
time  to  keep  his  eyes  open,  and  always  find  him  fast  asleep. 
He  is  a  shell-less  snail  that  rolls  about  in  a  carriage  while  I  go 
on  foot.  They  have  swindled  me  shamefully ;  I  do  nothing 
but  go  from  one  to  another,  and  I  see  that  I  ought  to  have 
gone  in  a  carriage.  They  will  not  look  at  you  here  unless 
you  hide  yourself  out  of  sight  in  a  carriage.  On  the  other 
hand,  in  the  Council  of  State  they  are  a  pack  of  do-nothings 
that  leave  a  set  of  little  rascals  in  our  prefect's  pay  to  do  their 

work  for  them That  is  the  history  of  my  lawsuit.  They 

want  my  factory  !  And,  well !  they  will  get  it.  And  they 
can  fight  it  out  with  my  workpeople,  a  hundred  strong,  that 
will  give  them  a  cudgeling  which  will  make  them  change  their 
minds " 

"Come  now,  cousin,  how  long  have  you  been  here?"  in- 
quired the  landscape  painter. 

"  For  two  whole  years.  Oh,  that  prefect  and  his  'disputed 
jurisdiction,'  he  shall  pay  dear  for  it ;  I  will  have  his  life,  and 
give  mine  for  it  at  the  Assize  Court " 

"  Which  councilor  is  chairman  of  your  committee?" 

"  An  ex-journalist,  not  worth  ten  sols,  though  they  call  him 
Massol." 

Lora  and  Bixiou  exchanged  glances. 

"And  the  commissioner?" 

"  Funnier  still !  It  is  a  master  of  requests,  a  professor  of 
something  or  other  at  the  Sorbonne ;  he  used  to  write  for 
some,  review.  I  p-r-rofess  the  deepest  disrespect  for  him " 

"  Claud  Vignon  ?"  suggested  Bixiou. 

"That  is  the  name — Massol  and  Vignon,  that  is  the  style 
of  the  unstable  firm  of  bandits  (Trestailtons)  in  league  with 
my  prefect." 

"There  is  hope  for  it  yet,"  said  L£on  de  Lora.  "You 
can  do  anything,  you  see,  in  Paris,  cousin— anything,  good 


344  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

or  bad,  just  or  unjust.  Anything  can  be  done  or  undone,  or 
done  over  again  here." 

"  I  will  be  hanged  if  I  will  stop  in  it  for  another  ten  sec- 
onds ;  it  is  the  dullest  place  in  France." 

As  he  spoke,  the  three  were  pacing  up  and  down  that 
stretch  of  asphalt  on  which  you  can  scarcely  walk  of  an  after- 
noon without  meeting  somebody  whose  name  has  been  pro- 
claimed from  Fame's  trumpet,  for  good  or  ill.  The  ground 
shifts.  Once  it  used  to  be  the  Place  Royale,  then  the  Pont 
Neuf  possessed  a  privilege  transferred  in  our  day  to  the  Boule- 
vard des  Italiens. 

The  landscape  painter  held  forth  for  his  cousin's  benefit. 
"  Paris,"  said  he,  "  is  an  instrument  which  a  man  must  learn 
to  play.  If  we  stop  here  for  ten  minutes,  I  will  give  you  a 
lesson.  There !  look,"  he  continued,  raising  his  cane  to 
point  out  a  couple  that  issued  from  the  Passage  de  1' Opera. 

"What  is  it?"  inquired  Gazonal. 

"It "  was  an  elderly  woman  dressed  in  a  very  showy  gown, 
a  faded  tartan  shawl,  and  a  bonnet  that  had  spent  six  months 
in  a  store-window.  Her  face  told  of  a  twenty  years'  residence 
in  a  damp  porter's  lodge,  and  her  bulging  market-basket 
showed  no  less  clearly  that  the  ex-portress  had  not  improved 
her  social  position.  By  her  side  walked  a  slim  and  slender 
damsel.  Her  eyes,  shaded  with  dark  lashes,  had  lost  their 
expression  of  innocence,  her  complexion  was  spoiled  with 
overwork,  but  her  features  were  prettily  cut,  her  face  was 
fresh,  her  hair  looked  thick,  her  brows  pert  and  engaging, 
her  figure  lacked  fullness — in  two  words,  it  was  a  green  apple. 

"It,"  answered  Bixiou,  "is  a  'rat'*  equipped  with  her 
mother." 

"Ar-r-rat?     What!    What?" 

Leon  favored  Mile.  Ninette  with  a  little  friendly  nod. 

"The  'rat'  may  win  your  lawsuit  for  you,"  he  said.    Gazonax 

*  Rat,  raton,  is  given  to  many  various  things :  police-spies,  lorettes, 
dandies,  a  jocular  term  between  men,  a  pet  name  for  infants,  etc. 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  345 

started,  but  Bixiou  had  him  by  the  arm.  It  had  struck  him 
as  they  left  the  cafe  that  the  southern  countenance  was  a  trifle 
flushed. 

"  The  rat  has  just  come  from  a  rehearsal  at  the  opera.  It 
is  on  its  way  home  to  its  scanty  dinner.  In  three  hours'  time 
it  will  come  back  to  dress,  if  it  comes  on  this  evening  in  the 
ballet,  that  is,  for  to-day  is  Monday.  The  rat  has  reached  the 
age  of  thirteen ;  it  is  an  old  rat  already.  In  two  years'  time 
the  creature's  market-price  will  be  sixty  thousand  francs;  she 
will  be  everything  or  nothing,  a  great  dancer  or  a  super,  she 
will  have  a  name  in  the  world  or  she  will  be  a  degraded  harlot. 
Her  working  life  began  at  the  age  of  eight.  Such  as  you  see 
her  to-day  she  is  exhausted ;  she  overtired  herself  this  morning 
at  the  dancing  class ;  she  has  just  come  out  of  a  rehearsal  as 
full  of  head-splitting  ins-and-outs  as  a  Chinese  puzzle;  and 
she  will  come  back  again  to-night.  The  rat  is  one  of  the 
foundation  stones  of  the  opera ;  the  rat  is  to  the  leading  lady 
of  the  ballet  as  the  little  clerk  is  to  the  notary.  The  rat  is 
Hope." 

"Who  brings  the  rat  into  the  world?"  asked  Gazonal. 

"  Porters,  poor  folk,  actors,  and  dancers,"  said  Bixiou. 
"  Nothing  but  the  direst  poverty  could  induce  an  eight-year- 
old  child  to  bear  such  torture  of  feet  and  joints,  to  lead  a 
well-conducted  life  till  she  is  sixteen  or  eighteen  years  old 
(simply  as  a  business  speculation),  and  to  keep  a  hideous  old 
woman  always  with  her  like  stable-litter  about  some  choice 
plant.  You  will  see  genius  of  every  kind  go  past — artists  in 
the  bud  and  artists  run  to  seed— all  of  them  engaged  in  rearing 
that  ephemeral  monument  to  the  glory  of  France,  called  the 
opera;  a  daily  renewed  combination  of  physical  and  mental 
strength,  will  and  genius,  found  nowhere  but  in  Paris." 

"  I  have  already  seen  the  opera,"  Gazonal  remarked  with  a 
self-sufficient  air. 

"Yes,  from  your  bench  at  three  francs  sixty  centimes,  as 
you  have  seen  Paris  from  the  Rue  Croix  des  Petits  Champs— 


346  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

without  knowing  anything  about  it.  What  did  they  give  at 
the  opera  when  you  went  ?  " 

"  «  William  Tell.'  " 

"Good,"  returned  L6on,  "you  must  have  enjoyed  Ma- 
thilde's  great  duet.  Well,  what  do  you  suppose  the  prima 
donna  did  as  soon  as  she  went  off  the  stage  ?  " 

"Did?     What?" 

"Sat  down  to  two  mutton  cutlets,  underdone,  which  her 
servant  had  prepared  for  her " 

"Ah!  foolery!" 

"Malibran  kept  herself  up  with  brandy — it  was  that  that 
killed  her.  Now  for  something  else.  You  have  seen  the 
ballet ;  now  you  have  just  seen  the  ballet  go  past  in  plain 
morning  dress,  not  knowing  that  your  lawsuit  depends  upon 
those  feet?" 

"My  lawsuit?" 

"There,  cousin,  there  goes  a  marcheuse,  as  she  is  called." 

Leon  pointed  out  one  of  the  superb  creatures  that  have 
lived  sixty  years  of  life  at  five-and-twenty;  a  beauty  so  un- 
questioned, so  certain  to  be  sought,  that  she  keeps  in  the 
shade.  She  was  tall,  she  walked  well,  with  a  dandy's  assured 
air,  and  her  toilet  was  striking  by  reason  of  its  ruinous  sim- 
plicity. 

"That  is  Carabine,"  said  Bixiou,  as  he  and  the  painter 
nodded  slightly,  and  Carabine  answered  with  a  smile. 

"  There  goes  another  who  can  cashier  your  prefect." 

"A  marcheuse  is  often  a  very  handsome  'rat '  sold  by  her 
real  or  pretended  mother  so  soon  as  it  is  certain  that  she  can 
neither  rank  as  a  first,  nor  second,  nor  third-rate  dancer ;  or 
else  she  prefers  her  calling  of  coryphee  to  any  other,  perhaps 
because  she  has  spent  her  youth  in  learning  to  dance  and 
knows  how  to  do  nothing  else.  She  met  no  doubt  with  rebuffs 
at  the  minor  theatres;  she  cannot  hope  to  succeed  in  the 
three  French  cities  which  maintain  a  corps  de  ballet,  she  has 
no  money,  or  no  wish  to  go  abroad,  for  you  must  know  that 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  347 

the  great  Paris  school  trains  dancers  for  the  rest  of  the  civil- 
ized world.  If  a  rat  becomes  a  marcheuse,  that  is  to  say,  a 
figurante,  she  must  have  had  some  weighty  reason  for  staying 
in  Paris — some  rich  man  whom  she  did  not  love,  that  is  to 
say,  or  a  poor  young  fellow  whom  she  loved  too  well.  The 
one  that  passed  just  now  will  dress  or  undress  three  times  in 
an  evening  as  a  princess,  a  peasant-girl,  a  Tyrolese,  and  the 
like,  and  gets  perhaps  two  hundred  francs  a  month." 
"  She  is  better  dressed  than  our  pr-r-refect's  wife." 
"  If  you  went  to  call  on  her,  you  would  find  a  maid,  a  cook, 
and  a  manservant  in  her  splendid  establishment  in  the  Rue 
Saint-Georges,"  said  Bixiou.  "But,  after  all,  as  modern  in- 
comes are  to  the  revenues  of  the  eighteenth-century  noblesse, 
so  is  she  to  the  eighteenth-century  opera-girl,  a  mere  wreck 
of  former  greatness.  Carabine  is  a  power  in  the  land.  At 
this  moment  she  rules  du  Tillet,  a  banker  with  a  good  deal  of 

influence  in  the  Chamber " 

"And  the  higher  ranks  of  the  ballet,  how  about  them?" 
"Look!"  said  Lora,  pointing  out  an  elegant  carriage 
which  crossed  the  boulevard  and  disappeared  down  the  Rue 
de  la  Grange-Bateliere,  "there  goes  one  of  our  leading  ladies 
of  the  ballet ;  put  her  name  on  the  placards,  and  she  will 
draw  all  Paris  ;  she  is  making  sixty  thousand  francs  per 
annum,  she  lives  like  a  princess.  The  price  of  your  factory 
would  not  buy  you  the  right  of  wishing  her  a  good-morning 
thirty  times." 

"  Eh,  well !  I  can  easily  say  it  to  myself;  it  will  cost  less." 
"  Do  you  see  that  good-looking  young  man  on  the  front 
seat  ?     He  is  a  vicomte  bearing  a  great  name,  and  he  is  her 
first  gentleman  of  the  chamber;  he  arranges  with  the  news- 
papers for  her ;  he  carries  peace  or  declares  war  of  a  morning 
on  the  manager  of  the  opera;  or  he  makes  it  his  business  to 
superintend  the  applause  when  she  come  on  or  off  the  stage." 
"  My  good  sirs,  this  beats  everything;  I  had  not  a  suspicion 
of  Paris  as  it  is." 


348  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"  Oh  well,  at  any  rate  you  may  as  well  find  out  what  may 
be  seen  in  ten  minutes  in  the  Passage  de  1' Opera.  There  !  " 
exclaimed  Bixiou. 

Two  persons,  a  man  and  a  woman,  came  out  as  he  spoke. 
The  woman  was  neither  pretty  nor  plain  ;  there  was  a  certain 
distinction  that  revealed  the  artist  in  the  fashion  and  color  of 
her  gown.  The  man  looked  rather  like  a  minor  canon. 

"That  is  a  double-bass  and  a  second  premier  sujet"  con- 
tinued Bixiou.  "  The  double-bass  is  a  tremendous  genius  ;  but 
the  double-bass,  being  a  mere  accessory  in  the  score,  scarcely 
makes  as  much  as  the  dancer.  The  second  sujet  made  a  great 
name  before  Taglioni  and  Elssler  appeared  ;  she  preserved  the 
traditions  of  the  character  dance  among  us  ;  she  would  have 
been  in  the  first  rank  to-day  if  the  other  two  had  not  come  to 
reveal  undreamed-of  poetry  in  the  dance ;  as  it  is,  she  is  only 
in  the  second  rank,  and  yet  she  draws  her  thirty  thousand 
francs,  and  has  a  faithful  friend  in  a  peer  of  France  with  great 
influence  in  the  Chamber.  Look  !  here  comes  the  third-rate 
dancer,  a  dancer  that  owes  her  (professional)  existence  to  the 
omnipotent  press.  If  her  engagement  had  not  been  renewed, 
the  men  in  office  would  have  had  one  more  enemy  on  their 
backs.  The  corps  de  ballets  is  the  great  power  at  the  opera  ; 
for  which  reason,  in  the  upper  ranks  of  dandyism  and  politics, 
it  is  much  better  form  to  make  a  connection  among  the 
dancers  than  among  the  singers.  'Monsieur  goes  in  for 
music,'  is  a  kind  of  a  joke  among  the  frequenters  of  the 
opera  in  the  orchestra." 

A  short,  ordinary-looking,  plainly-dressed  man  went  past. 

"At  last  here  comes  the  other  half  of  the  receipts — the 
tenor.  There  is  no  poetry,  no  music,  no  acting  possible  with- 
out a  famous  tenor  that  can  take  a  certain  high  note.  The 
tenor  means  the  element  of  love,  a  voice  that  reaches  the  heart, 
that  thrills  the  soul ;  and  when  this  voice  resolves  itself  into 
figures,  it  means  a  larger  income  than  a  cabinet  minister's.  A 
hundred  thousand  francs  for  a  throat,  a  hundred  thousand  for 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  349 

a  pair  of  ankles — behold  the  two  financial  scourges  of  the 
opera." 

"  It  fills  me  with  amazement  to  see  so  many  hundred  thou- 
sand francs  walking  about,"  said  Gazonal. 

"  You  will  soon  see  a  great  deal  more,  dear  cousin  of  mine. 
Come  with  us.  We  will  take  Paris  as  an  artist  takes  up  the 
violoncello,  and  show  you  how  to  play  the  great  instrument, 
show  you  how  we  amuse  ourselves  in  Paris  in  fact." 

"It  is  a  kaleidoscope  seven  leagues  round,"  cried  Gazonal. 

"  Before  we  begin  to  pilot  this  gentleman,  I  must  see  Gail- 
lard,"  began  Bixiou. 

"And  Gaillard  may  help  us  in  the  cousin's  affairs." 

"What  is  the  new  scene  ?" 

"It  is  not  a  scene,  but  a  scene-shifter.  Gaillard  is  a  friend 
of  ours ;  he  has  come  at  last  to  be  the  managing  director  of  a 
newspaper;  his  character,  like  his  cash-box,  is  chiefly  remark- 
able for  its  tidal  ebb  and  flow.  Gaillard  possibly  may  help  to 
win  your  lawsuit." 

"  It  is  lost " 

"  Just  the  time  to  win  it  then  !  "  returned  Bixiou. 

Arrived  at  Theodore  Gaillard's  house  in  the  Ruede  M£nars, 
the  friends  were  informed  by  the  footman  that  his  master  was 
engaged.  It  was  a  private  interview. 

"With  whom?"  inquired  Bixiou. 

"  With  a  man  that  is  driving  a  bargain  to  imprison  a  debtor 
that  cannot  be  caught,"  said  a  voice,  and  a  very  handsome 
woman  appeared  in  a  dainty  morning  gown. 

"In  that  case,  dear  Suzanne,  the  rest  of  us  may  walk 
in " 

"  Oh  !  what  a  lovely  creature  !  "  cried  Gazonal. 

"That  is  Madame  Gaillard"  said  Leon  de  Lora;  and, 
lowering  his  voice  for  his  cousin's  ear,  he  added:  "You  see 
before  you,  dear  fellow,  as  modest  a  woman  as  you  will  find 
in  Paris  ;  she  has  retired  from  public  life,  and  is  contented 
with  one  husband." 


350  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"What  can  I  do  for  you,  my  lords?"  said  the  facetious 
managing  director,  imitating  Frederick  Lemaltre. 

Theodore  Gaillard  had  been  a  clever  man  ;  but,  as  so  often 
happens  in  Paris,  he  had  grown  stupid  with  staying  too  long 
in  the  same  groove.  The  principal  charm  of  his  conversation 
consisted  in  tags  of  quotation  with  which  it  was  garnished, 
bits  from  popular  plays  mouthed  after  the  manner  of  some 
well-known  actor. 

"  We  have  come  for  a  chat,"  said  Le"on. 

"  'Enctirc,  jetinc  hdmej  a  la  Odry."  [Correctly :  Encore,, 
jeune  homme ;  meaning:  Again,  young  man.] 

"This  time  we  shall  have  him  for  certain,"  said  Gaillard's 
interlocutor  by  way  of  conclusion. 

"Are  you  quite  sure  of  that,  Daddy  Fromenteau  ?  This  is 
the  eleventh  time  that  we  have  had  him  fast  at  night,  and  in 
the  morning  he  was  gone." 

"What  can  you  do?  I  never  saw  such  a  debtor.  He  is 
like  a  locomotive,  he  goes  to  sleep  in  Paris  and  wakes  up  in 
Seine-et-Oise.  He  is  a  puzzle  for  a  locksmith." 

Seeing  Gaillard  smile,  he  added,  "  That  is  how  we  talk  in 
our  line.  You  '  nab '  a  man  or  you  lock  him  up ;  that  means 
you  arrest  him.  They  talk  differently  in  the  criminal  police. 
Vidocq  used  to  say  to  his  man,  '  They  have  it  ready  for  you  ! ' 
which  was  all  the  funnier  because  'it'  meant  the  guillotine." 

Bixiou  jogged  Gazonal's  elbow,  and  at  once  the  visitor  be- 
came all  eyes  and  ears.  "Does  monsieur  give  palm  oil?" 
continued  Fromenteau,  quite  quietly,  though  there  was  a  per- 
ceptible shade  of  menace  in  the  tone. 

"It  is  a  matter  of  fifty  centimes,"  said  Gaillard  (a  reminis- 
cence of  Odry  in  Les  Saltimbanques),  as  he  handed  over  five 
francs  to  Fromenteau. 

"And  for  the  blackguards?"  the  man  went  on. 

"Who  are  they?" 

"  Those  in  my  employ,"  Fromenteau  replied  imperturbably. 

"  Is  there  any  one  lower  yet  ?  "  asked  Bixiou. 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  351 

"Oh,  yes,  sir,"  the  detective  replied.  "There  are  some 
that  give  us  information  unconsciously  and  get  no  pay  for  it. 
I  put  flats  and  noodles  lower  than  blackguards." 

"  The  blackguards  are  often  very  good-looking  and  clever," 
exclaimed  Leon. 

"Then  do  you  belong  to  the  police?"  asked  Gazonal, 
uneasily  and  curiously  eyeing  this  little  weazened,  impassive 
person,  dressed  like  an  attorney's  under-clerk. 

"Which  kind  do  you  mean  ?"  returned  Fromenteau. 

"  Are  their  several  kinds  ?  " 

"As  many  as  five,"  said  Fromenteau.  "There  is  the 
Criminal  Department  (Vidocq  used  to  be  at  the  head  of  it); 
the  Secret  Superintendence  (no  one  knows  the  chief);  the 
Political  Department  (Fouche's  own) ;  and  the  Chateau,  the 
system  directly  in  the  employ  of  the  Emperor  and  Louis 
XVIII.,  and  so  on.  The  Chateau  was  always  squabbling  with 
the  other  department  at  the  Quai  Malaquais.  That  came  to 
an  end  with  M.  Decazes.  I  used  to  belong  to  Louis  XVIII. ; 
I  have  been  on  the  force  ever  since  1793  along  with  poor 
Contenson." 

The  listeners  looked  at  one  another,  each  with  one  thought 
in  their  minds — "  How  many  men's  heads  has  he  cut  off  ?  " 

"And  now  they  want  to  do  without  us — tomfoolery!" 
added  the  little  man  that  had  grown  so  terrific  all  on  a  sud- 
den. "  Since  1830  they  will  only  employ  respectable  people 
at  the  prefecture ;  I  sent  in  my  resignation,  and  learned  my 
little  knack  of  nabbing  prisoners  for  debt." 

"  He  is  the  right  hand  of  the  commercial  police,"  said 
Gaillard,  lowering  his  voice  for  Bixiou  ;  "  but  you  can  never 
tell  whether  debtor  or  creditor  pays  him  most." 

"The  dirtier  the  business,  the  more  need  for  strict  hon- 
esty," said  Fromenteau  sententiously ;  "lam  for  those  that 
pay  best.  You  want  to  recover  fifty  thousand  francs,  and 
you  higgle  over  centimes.  Give  me  five  hundred  francs,  and 
to-morrow  morning  we  will  have  him  in  the  stone  jug." 


352  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"Five  hundred  francs  for  you  yourself!  "  cried  Theodore 
Gaillard. 

"  Lisette  wants  a  shawl,"  answered  the  detective  without 
moving  a  muscle  of  his  countenance.  "I  call  her  'Lisette' 
because  of  Beranger." 

"  You  have  a  Lisette,  and  still  you  stay  in  your  line  !  " 
cried  the  virtuous  Gazonal. 

"  It  is  so  amusing.  Talk  of  field  sports ;  it  is  far  more 
interesting  to  run  a  man  to  earth  in  Paris  !  " 

"  They  must  be  uncommonly  clever  to  do  it,  and  that  is  a 
fact,"  said  Gazonal,  thinking  alo'ud. 

"Oh,  if  I  were  to  reckon  up  all  the  qualities  that  a  man 
needs  if  he  is  to  make  his  mark  in  our  line,  you  would  think 
I  was  describing  a  man  of  genius,"  replied  Fromenteau,  tak- 
ing Gazonal's  measure  at  a  glance.  "You  must  be  lynx- 
eyed,  must  you  not  ?  Bold — for  you  must  drop  into  a  house 
like  a  bombshell,  walk  up  to  people  as  if  you  had  known  them 
all  your  life,  and  propose  the  never-refused  dirty  business,  and 
so  on.  You  must  have  Memory,  Sagacity,  Invention — for 
you  must  be  quick  to  think  of  expedients,  and  never  repeat 
yourself;  espionage  must  always  be  moulded  on  the  individual 
character  of  those  with  whom  you  have  to  do — but  invention 
is  a  gift  of  heaven.  Then  you  need  agility,  strength,  and  so 
on.  All  these  faculties,  gentlemen,  are  painted  up  over  the 
door  of  Amoros'  Gymnasium  as  virtues.  All  these  things  we 
must  possess  under  penalty  of  forfeiting  the  salary  of  a  hun- 
dred francs  per  month  paid  us  by  the  Government,  in  the 
Rue  de  Jerusalem,  or  the  commercial  police." 

"And  you  appear  to  me  to  be  a  remarkable  man,"  said 
Gazonal.  Fromenteau  looked  at  him,  but  he  neither  an- 
swered nor  showed  any  sign  of  feeling,  and  went  away  with- 
out taking  leave,  an  unmistakable  sign  of  genius. 

"Well,  cousin,  you  have  just  seen  the  police  incarnate," 
said  Leon. 

"I  have  had  quite  as  much  as  I  want,"  returned  the  honest 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  353 

manufacturer.  Gaillard  and  Bixiou  chatted  together  mean- 
while in  an  undertone. 

"  I  will  send  round  an  answer  to-night  to  Carabine's," 
Gaillard  said  aloud  ;  and,  sitting  down  to  his  desk,  he  took 
no  further  notice  of  Gazonal. 

"Insolence  !  "  fumed  the  child  of  the  South  on  the  thresh- 
old. 

"  His  paper  has  twenty-two  thousand  subscribers,"  said 
Leon  de  Lora.  "  He  is  one  of  the  great  powers  of  the  age ; 
he  has  not  time  to  be  polite  of  a  morning." 

"  If  go  we  must  to  the  Chamber  to  arrange  this  lawsuit,  let 
us  take  the  longest  way  round,"  said  Leon. 

"Great  men's  sayings  are  just  like  gilded  silver,"  retorted 
Bixiou;  "use  wears  the  gilt  off  the  silver,  and  all  the  sparkle 
goes  out  of  the  sayings  if  they  are  repeated.  But  where  are 
we  going?" 

"  To  see  our  hatter  near  by,"  returned  Leon. 

"  Bravo  !  If  we  go  on  like  this,  we  may  perhaps  have  some 
fun." 

"Gazonal,"  began  Leon,  "I  will  draw  him  out  for  your 
benefit.  Only — you  must  look  as  solemn  as  a  king  on  a  five- 
franc  piece,  for  you  are  going  to  see  gratis  an  uncommonly 
queer  quiz;  the  man's  self-importance  has  turned  his  head. 
In  these  days,  my  dear  fellow,  everybody  wants  to  cover 
himself  with  glory,  and  a  good  many  cover  themselves  with 
ridicule,  and  hence  we  have  entirely  new  living  carica- 
tures  " 

"When  everybody  is  glorious  together,  how  is  a  man  to 
distinguish  himself?"  asked  Gazonal. 

"  Distinguish  yourself?  "  repeated  Bixiou.  "  Be  a  noodle. 
Your  cousin  wears  a  ribbon ;  I  am  well  dressed,  and  people 
look  at  me,  not  at  him." 

After  this  remark,  which  may  perhaps  explain  why  so  many 
orators  and  other  great  politicians  never  appear  in  the  streets 
with  a  ribbon  in  their  button-holes,  L£on  de  Lora  pointed  out 
23 


354  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

a  name  painted  in  gilt  letters  over  a  store-front.  It  was  the 
illustrious  name  of  an  author  of  a  pamphlet  on  hats,  a  person 
who  pays  newspaper  proprietors  as  much  for  advertisements  as 
any  three  vendors  of  sugar-plums  or  patent  pills.  It  ran : 
VITAL  (LATE  FINOT),  HAT  MANUFACTURER — not  plain  HATTER, 
as  heretofore. 

Bixiou  called  Gazonal's  attention  to  the  glories  of  the  store- 
window.  "  Vital,  my  dear  boy,  is  making  forty  thousand 
francs  per  annum." 

"And  he  is  still  in  business  as  a  hatter!"  exclaimed 
Gazonal,  nearly  breaking  Bixiou's  arm  with  a  violent  wrench. 

"  You  shall  see  the  man  directly,"  added  Leon  ;  "  you  want 
a  hat,  you  shall  have  one  gratis." 

"  Is  Monsieur  Vital  not  in  ?  "  asked  Bixiou,  seeing  no  one 
at  the  desk. 

"Monsieur  is  correcting  proofs  in  his  private  office,"  said 
the  assistant. 

"  What  do  you  think  of  that,  hey?  "  said  Leon,  turning  to 
his  cousin.  Then  to  the  assistant,  "  Can  we  speak  to  him 
without  disturbing  his  inspirations?" 

"Let  the  gentlemen  come  in,"  called  a  voice — a  bourgeois 
voice,  a  voice  to  inspire  confidence  in  voters,  a  powerful  voice, 
suggestive  of  a  good  steady  income,  and  Vital  vouchsafed  to 
show  himself.  He  was  dressed  in  black  from  head  to  foot, 
and  carried  a  diamond  pin  in  his  resplendent  shirt-frill.  Be- 
yond him  the  three  friends  caught  a  glimpse  of  a  young  and 
pretty  woman  sitting  at  a  desk  with  a  piece  of  embroidery  in 
her  hands. 

Vital  was  between  thirty  and  forty  years  of  age ;  native 
joviality  had  been  repressed  in  him  by  ambitions.  It  is  the 
privilege  of  a  fine  organization  to  be  neither  tall  nor  short, 
and  Vital  enjoyed  that  advantage.  He  was  tolerably  stout, 
and  careful  of  his  appearance ;  and  if  the  hair  had  grown 
rather  thin  on  his  forehead,  he  turned  the  partial  baldness 
to  account,  to  give  himself  the  airs  of  a  man  consumed  by 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  355 

thought.  You  could  see  by  the  way  that  his  wife  looked  at 
him  that  she  admired  her  husband  for  a  great  man  and  a 
genius.  Vital  loved  artists.  Not  that  he  had  himself  any 
taste  for  the  arts,  but  he  felt  that  he  was  one  of  the  confra- 
ternity ;  he  believed  that  he  was  an  artist,  and  brought  the  fact 
home  to  you  by  sedulously  disclaiming  all  right  to  that  noble 
title,  and  constantly  relegating  himself  to  an  enormous  dis- 
tance from  the  arts  to  draw  out  the  remark,  "  Why,  you  have 
raised  the  manufacture  of  hats  to  the  dignity  of  a  science." 

"  Have  you  found  the  hat  for  me  at  last?"  inquired  Leon 
de  Lora. 

''What,  sir,  in  one  fortnight!  A  hat  for  you/"  remon- 
strated Vital.  "  Why,  two  months  will  scarcely  be  long 
enough  to  strike  out  a  shape  to  suit  you  !  Look,  here  is  your 
lithograph,  there  it  lies.  I  have  studied  you  very  carefully 
already.  I  would  not  take  so  much  trouble  for  a  prince,  but 
you  are  something  more,  you  are  an  artist.  And  you  under- 
stand me,  my  dear  sir." 

"  Here  is  one  of  our  great  inventors ;  he  would  be  as  great 
a  man  as  Jacquart  if  he  would  but  consent  to  die  for  a  bit," 
said  Bixiou,  introducing  Gazonal.  "Our  friend  here  is  a 
cloth  weaver,  the  inventor  of  a  way  of  restoring  the  indigo 
color  in  old  clothes ;  he  wanted  to  see  you  as  a  great  phe- 
nomenon, for  it  was  you  who  said  :  '  The  hat  is  the  man.'  It 
sent  this  gentleman  into  ecstasies.  Ah!  Vital,  you  have 
faith  !  You  believe  in  something ;  you  have  a  passion  for 
your  work !  " 

Vital  scarcely  heard  the  words,  his  face  had  grown  pale 
with  joy. 

"Rise,   wife.     This  gentleman  is  one  of  the  princes  of 

science !  " 

Mme.  Vital   rose   at  a  sign  from  her  husband;  Gazonal 

bowed. 

"Shall  I  have  the  honor  of  finding  a  hat  for  you?"  con- 
tinued Vital,  radiant  and  officious. 


366  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"At  my  price,"  said  Bixiou. 

'<  Quite  so.  I  ask  nothing  but  the  pleasure  of  an  occasional 
mention  from  you,  gentlemen.  Monsieur  must  have  a  pic- 
turesque hat,  something  in  Monsieur  Lousteau's  style,"  he 
continued,  looking  at  Bixiou  with  the  air  of  one  laying  down 
the  law.  "  I  will  think  of  a  shape." 

"You  take  a  great  deal  of  trouble,"  said  Gazonal. 

"  Oh  !  only  for  a  few  persons;  only  for  those  who  can  ap- 
preciate the  value  of  the  pains  that  I  take.  Why,  among  the 
aristocracy  there  is  but  one  man  who  really  understands  a  hat 
— the  Prince  de  Bethune.  How  is  it  that  men  do  not  see,  as 
women  do,  that  the  hat  is  the  first  thing  to  strike  the  eye  ? 
Why  do  they  not  think  of  changing  the  present  state  of  things, 
which  is  disgraceful,  it  must  be  said.  But  a  Frenchman,  of 
all  people,  is  the  most  persistent  in  his  folly.  I  quite  know 
the  difficulties,  gentlemen  !  I  am  not  speaking  now  of  my 
writings  on  a  subject  which  I  believe  I  have  approached  in  a 
philosophical  spirit ;  but  simply  as  a  practical  hatter  I  have 
discovered  the  means  of  individualizing  the  hideous  headgear 
which  Frenchmen  are  privileged  to  wear  until  I  can  succeed 
in  abolishing  it  altogether." 

He  held  up  an  example  of  the  hideous  modern  hat. 

"Behold  the  enemy,  gentlemen.  To  think  that  the  most 
intelligent  nation  under  the  sun  should  consent  to  put  this 
'  stove-pipe  '  (as  one  of  our  own  writers  has  said),  this  '  stove- 
pipe '  upon  their  heads  ! Here  you  see  the  various  curves 

which  I  have  introduced  into  those  dreadful  lines,"  he  added, 
pointing  out  one  of  his  own  "creations."  "  Yet,  although  I 
understand  how  to  suit  the  hat  to  the  wearer — as  you  see,  for 
here  is  a  doctor's  hat,  this  is  for  a  tradesman,  and  that  for  a 
dandy  or  an  artist,  a  stout  man,  a  thin  man — still,  the  hat  in 
itself  is  always  hideous.  There,  do  you  fully  grasp  my  whole 
idea?" 

He  took  up  a  broad-brimmed  hat  with  a  low  crown. 

"  This  is  an  old  hat  belonging  to  Claud  Vignon,  the  great 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  357 

critic,  independent  writer,  and  free  liver,  etc.  He  has  gone 
to  the  suppport  of  the  Ministry,  he  is  a  professor  and  librarian, 
he  only  writes  for  the  '  Debats '  now,  he  has  gained  the  post 
of  master  of  requests.  He  has  an  income  of  sixteen  thousand 
francs,  he  makes  four  thousand  francs  by  his  journalistic  work, 
he  wears  a  ribbon  at  his  button-hole.  Well,  here  is  his  new 
hat." 

Vital  exhibited  a  head  covering,  the  juste  milieu  (impartial 
magistrate)  visible  in  every  line. 

"  You  ought  to  have  made  him  a  harlequin's  hat,"  exclaimed 
Gazonal. 

"Your  genius  rises  over  other  people's  heads,  Monsieur 
Vital,"  said  Leon. 

Vital  bowed,  unsuspicious  of  the  joke. 

"  Can  you  tell  me  why  your  stores  are  the  last  of  all  to  close 
here  in  Paris  ?  They  are  open  even  later  than  the  cafes  and 
drinking  bars.  It  really  tickles  my  curiosity,"  said  Gazonal. 

"In  the  first  place,  our  windows  look  their  best  when 
lighted  up  at  night ;  and  for  one  hat  that  we  sell  in  the  day- 
time, we  sell  five  at  night." 

"  Everything  is  queer  in  Paris,"  put  in  Leon. 

"Well,  in  spite  of  my  efforts  and  my  success"  (Vital  pur- 
sued his  panegyric),  "  we  must  come  to  the  round  crown.  I 
am  working  in  that  direction." 

'•'What  hinders  you?"  asked  Gazonal. 

'-  Cheapness,  sir.  You  start  with  a  stock  of  fine  silk  hats  at 
fifteen  francs — the  price  would  kill  the  trade ;  Parisians  never 
have  fifteen  francs  of  ready  money  to  invest  in  a  new  hat.  A 
beaver  costs  thirty  francs,  but  the  problem  is  the  same  as  ever. 
Beaver,  I  say,  though  there  are  not  ten  pounds'  weight  of 
real  beaver-skins  bought  in  France  in  a  year.  The  article  is 
worth  three  hundred  and  fifty  francs  per  pound,  and  an  ounce 
is  needed  for  a  hat.  And,  beside,  the  beaver  hat  is  not  good 
for  much  ;  the  skin  dyes  badly  ;  it  turns  rusty  in  the  sunshine 
in  ten  minutes ;  it  subsides  at  once  in  the  heat.  What  we  call 


358  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

'  beaver '  is  really  nothing  but  hare-skin  ;  the  best  hats  are 
made  from  the  backs,  the  second  quality  from  the  sides,  and 
the  third  from  the  bellies.  I  am  telling  you  trade-secrets,  you 
are  men  of  honor.  But  whether  you  carry  beaver  or  hare-skin 
on  your  head,  the  problem  is  equally  insoluble — how  to  find 
fifteen  or  thirty  francs  of  ready  money.  A  man  must  pay  cash 
for  his  hat — you  behold  the  consequences  !  The  honor  of  the 
garb  of  Gaul  will  be  saved  when  a  round  gray  hat  shall  cost  a 
hundred  francs.  When  that  day  comes  we  shall  give  credit, 
like  the  tailors.  To  that  end  people  must  be  persuaded  to 
wear  the  buckle,  the  gold  galoon,  the  plumes,  and  satin-lined 
brims  of  the  times  of  Louis  XIII.  and  Louis  XIV.  Our  busi- 
ness would  expand  ten  times  over  if  we  went  into  the  fancy 
line.  France  would  be  the  hat-mart  of  the  world,  just  as 
Paris  always  sets  the  fashion  in  women's  dress.  The  present 
hat  may  be  made  anywhere.  Ten  million  francs  of  export 
trade  to  be  secured  for  Paris  is  involved  in  the  ques- 
tion  " 

"A  revolution  !  "  cried  Bixiou,  working  up  enthusiasm. 

"Yes,  a  radical  revolution.  The  form  must  be  re- 
modeled." 

"You  are  happy  after  Luther's  fashion,"  said  Leon,  al- 
ways on  the  lookout  for  a  pun.  "  You  are  dreaming  of  a 
reformation." 

"Yes,  sir.  Ah  !  if  the  twelve  or  fifteen  artists,  capitalists, 
or  dandies  that  set  the  fashion  would  but  have  courage  for 
twenty-four  hours,  there  would  be  a  great  commercial  victory 
won  for  France.  See  here !  as  I  tell  my  wife,  I  would  give 
my  fortune  to  succeed.  Yes,  it  is  my  one  ambition  to  re- 
generate the  hat — and  to  disappear." 

"The  man  is  stupendous,"  remarked  Gazonal,  when  they 
had  left  the  store,  "  but  all  your  eccentrics  have  a  touch  of  the 
South  about  them,  I  do  assure  you " 

"Let  us  go  along  the  Rue  Saint-Marc,"  said  Bixiou. 

"  Are  we  to  see  something  else  ?  " 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  339 

"Yes,  you  are  going  to  see  a  money-lender— a  money- 
lender among  the  '  rats '  and  marchcuses.  A. woman  that  has 
more  hideous  secrets  in  her  keeping  than  gowns  in  her  store- 
windows,"  said  Bixiou. 

He  pointed  as  he  spoke  to  a  dirty-looking  store  like  a  blot 
on  the  dazzling  expanse  of  modern  street.  It  had  last  been 
painted  somewhere  about  the  year  1820,  a  subsequent  bank- 
ruptcy must  have  left  it  in  a  dubious  condition  on  the  owner's 
hands,  and  now  the  color  was  obscured  by  a  thick  coating  of 
grime  and  dust.  The  windows  were  filthy,  the  door-handle 
had  that  significant  trick  of  turning  of  its  own  accord,  char- 
acteristic of  every  place  which  people  enter  in  a  hurry,  only 
to  leave  more  promptly  still. 

"What  do  you  say  to  this?  Death's  cousin-german,  is 
she  not?"  L6on  muttered  in  Gazonal's  ear,  pointing  out  a 
terrific  figure  behind  the  counter.  "  She  is  Madame  Nour- 
risson  ? ' ' 

"  How  much  for  the  guipure,*  madame?  "  asked  Gazonal, 
not  to  be  behindhand. 

"To  you,  monsieur,  only  a  hundred  crowns,  as  you  come 
from  so  far."  Then  remarking  a  certain  southern  start  of 
surprise,  she  added,  with  a  touch  of  pathos  in  her  voice,  "  It 
belonged  to  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe,  poor  thing." 

"What!  here!  right  under  the  Tuileries?"  cried  Bixiou. 

"Monsieur,  'they'  don't  believe  it,"  said  she. 

"  We  did  not  come  here  as  buyers,  madame,"  Bixiou  began 
valiantly. 

"So  I  see,  monsieur,"  retorted  Mme.  Nourrisson. 

"We  have  several  things  to  sell,"  continued  the  illustrious 
caricaturist.  "I  live  at  Number  112  Rue  de  Richelieu,  sixth 
floor.  If  you  like  to  look  in,  in  a  moment,  you  may  pick  up 
a  famous  bargain " 

"Perhaps  monsieur  would  like  a  bit  of  muslin;  it  is  very 
much  worn  just  now?  "  smiled  she. 

*  The  name  of  a  lace. 


360  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"No.  It  is  a  matter  of  a  wedding-dress,"  L6on  de  Lota 
said  with  much  gravity. 

Fifteen  minutes  later,  Mme.  Nourrisson  actually  appeared 
at  Bixiou's  rooms.  Leon  and  Gazonal  had  come  home  with 
him  to  see  the  end  of  the  jest,  and  Mme.  Nourrisson  found 
the  trio  looking  as  sober  as  three  authors  whose  work  (written 
in  collaboration)  has  not  met  with  that  success  which  it  de- 
served. • 

Bixiou  unblushingly  produced  a  pair  of  lady's  slippers. 
"These,  madame,  belonged  to  the  Empress  Josephine,"  said 
he,  giving  Mme.  Nourrisson,  as  in  duty  bound,  the  small 
change  for  her  Princesse  de  Lamballe. 

"  That?" cried  she.  "Why,  it  was  new  this  year; 

look  at  the  mark  on  the  sole." 

"  Can  you  not  guess  that  the  pair  of  slippers  is  a  prelude  to 
the  romance,"  said  Leon  ;  "  and  not,  as  usual,  the  sequel." 

"My  friend  here  from  the  South,"  put  in  Bixiou,  "wishes 
to  marry  a  certain  young  lady,  very  well-to-do  and  well  con- 
nected ;  but  he  would  like  to  know  beforehand  (huge  family 
interests  being  at  stake)  whether  there  has  been  any  slip  in 
the  past." 

"  How  much  is  monsieur  willing  to  pay?"  she  asked,  eye- 
ing the  prospective  bridegroom. 

"A  hundred  francs,"  said  Gazonal,  no  longer  astonished 
at  anything. 

"  Many  thanks,"  said  she,  with  a  grimace  which  a  monkey 
might  despairingly  envy. 

"  Come,  now,  how  much  do  you  want,  Madame  Nour- 
risson?" asked  Bixiou,  putting  his  arm  round  her  waist. 

"First  of  all,  my  dear  gentlemen,  never  since  I  have  been 
in  business  have  I  seen  any  one,  man  or  woman,  beating  down 
the  price  of  happiness.  And,  in  the  second  place,  you  are 
all  three  of  you  chaffing  me,"  she  added,  and  a  smile  that 
stole  over  her  hard  lips  was  reinforced  by  a  gleam  of  cat-like 
suspicion  in  her  eyes.  "Now,  if  your  happiness  is  not  in- 


FIFTEEN    MINUTES    LATER,    MME.    NOURRISSON    ACTUALLY 
APPEARED    AT   BIXIOU'S   ROOMS. 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  361 

volved,  your  fortune  is  at  stake,  and  a  man  that  lives  up  so 
many  flights  of  stairs  is  still  less  the  person  to  haggle  over  a 
rich  match.  Come,  now,  what  is  it  all  about,  my  lambs?" 
with  sudden  affability. 

"  We  want  to  know  about  the  firm  of  Beunier  and  Com- 
pany," said  Bixiou,  very  well  pleased  to  pick  up  some  infor- 
mation concerning  a  person  in  whom  he  was  interested. 

"  Oh  1  a  louis  will  be  enough  for  that " 

"And  why?" 

"  I  have  all  the  mother's  jewels.  She  is  hard  up  from  one 
quarter  to  another ;  why,  it  is  all  she  can  do  to  pay  interest 
on  the  money  she  owes  me.  Are  you  looking  for  a  wife  in 
that  quarter  ?  You  noodle  !  Hand  me  over  forty  francs  and 
I  will  give  you  a  good  hundred  crowns'  worth  of  gossip." 

Gazonal  brought  a  forty-franc  piece  to  light,  and  Mine. 
Nourrisson  gave  them  some  startling  stories  of  the  straits  to 
which  some  so-called  ladies  are  reduced.  The  old  wardrobe- 
dealer  grew  lively  as  she  talked,  sketching  her  own  portrait 
in  the  course  of  the  conversation.  Without  betraying  a 
single  confidence,  without  letting  fall  a  single  name,  she  made 
her  audience  shudder  by  allowing  them  to  see  how  much 
prosperity  in  Paris  is  based  on  the  quaking  foundation  of 
borrowed  money.  In  her  drawers  she  had  keepsakes  set  in 
gold  and  brilliants,  memorials  of  grandmothers  long  dead 
and  gone,  of  children  still  in  life,  of  husbands  or  grand- 
children laid  in  the  grave.  She  had  heard  ghastly  stories 
wrung  from  anger,  passion,  or  pique,  told,  it  may  be,  by  one 
customer  of  another,  or  drawn  from  borrowers  in  the  necessary 
course  of  sedative  treatment  which  ends  in  a  loan. 

"Why  did  you  enter  this  line  of  business?"  asked  Gazonal. 

"For  my  son's  sake,"  she  replied  simply. 

Women  that  go  up  and  down  back  stairs  to  ply  their  trade 
in  are  always  brimful  of  excuses  based  on  the  best  of  motives. 
Mme.  Nourrisson,  by  her  own  account,  had  lost  three  matches, 
three  daughters  that  turned  out  very  badly,  and  all  her  illu- 


362  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

sions  to  boot.  She  produced  pawn-tickets  for  some  of  her 
best  goods,  she  said,  just  to  show  the  risks  of  the  trade.  How 
she  should  meet  the  end  of  the  month,  she  did  not  know ; 
people  "  robbed  "  her  to  such  a  degree. 

The  word  was  a  little  too  strong.  The  artists  exchanged 
glances. 

"Look  here,  boys,  I  will  just  show  you  how  we  get  taken 
in.  This  did  not  happen  to  me,  but  to  my  neighbor  over  the 
way,  Madame  Mahuchet,  a  ladies'  shoemaker.  I  had  been 
lending  money  to  a  countess,  a  woman  with  more  crazes  than 
she  can  afford.  She  swaggers  it  with  a  fine  house  and  grand 
furniture ;  she  has  At  Homes,  she  makes  a  deuce  of  a  dash. 

"Well,  she  owed  her  shoemaker  three  hundred  francs,  and 
was  giving  a  dinner  and  a  party  no  further  back  than  the  day 
before  yesterday.  Madame  Mahuchet,  hearing  of  this  from 
the  cook,  came  to  me  about  it,  and  we  got  excited  over  the 
news.  She  was  for  making  a  fuss,  but  for  my  own  part — 
'My  dear  Mother  Mahuchet,'  I  said,  'where  is  the  use  of  it? 
Just  to  get  a  bad  name ;  it  is  better  to  get  good  security.  It 
is  diamond  cut  diamond,  and  you  save  your  bile.'  But  go 
she  would  ;  she  asked  me  to  back  her  up,  and  we  went  together. 
'  Madame  is  not  at  home.'  '  Go  on  ! '  said  Mother  Mahuchet. 
'  We  will  wait  for  her  if  I  stop  here  till  midnight  ! '  So  we 
camped  down  in  the  antechamber  and  chatted  together. 
Well,  doors  opened  and  shut ;  by-and-by  there  was  a  sound 
of  little  footsteps  and  low  voices ;  and,  for  my  own  part,  I 
felt  sorry.  The  company  was  coming  to  dinner.  You  can 
judge  of  the  turn  things  took. 

"  The  countess  sent  in  her  own  woman  to  wheedle  la  Mahu- 
chet— '  You  shall  be  paid  to-morrow  ' — and  all  the  rest  of  the 
ways  of  trying  it  on.  No  go.  Then  the  countess,  in  her 
Sunday  best,  as  you  may  say,  comes  into  the  dining-room. 
La  Mahuchet  hears  her,  flings  open  the  door,  and  walks  in. 
Lord  !  at  the  sight  of  the  dinner-table,  all  sparkling  like  a 
jewel-case,  the  dish-covers  and  the  plate  and  the  candle- 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  363 

sconces,  she  went  off  like  a  soda-water  bottle.  She  flings  out 
her  bomb — '  Those  that  spend  other  people's  money  have  no 
business  to  give  dinner-parties;  they  ought  to  live  quietly. 
You  a  countess !  and  you  owe  a  hundred  crowns  to  a  poor 
shoemaker's  wife  with  seven  children  ! '  You  can  imagine  how 
she  ran  on,  an  uneducated  woman  as  she  is.  At  the  first  word 
of  excuse — '  No  money ' — from  the  countess,  la  Mahuche! 
cries  out,  '  Eh  !  my  lady,  but  there  is  plate  here  !  Pawn  your 
spoons  and  forks  and  pay  me  ! '  'Take  them  yourself,'  says 
the  countess,  catching  up  half-a-dozen  and  slipping  them  into 
her  hand,  and  we  hurried  away  downstairs  pellmell.  What  a 
success !  Bah  !  no.  Out  in  the  street  tears  came  into  la 
Mahuchet's  eyes,  she  is  a  good  soul ;  she  took  the  things  back, 
and  apologized.  She  found  out  the  depths  of  the  countess' 
poverty  and — they  were  German  silver  !  " 

"  Dishcovered  that  she  had  no  cover,"  commented  Leon  de 
Lora,  in  whom  the  Mistigris  of  old  was  apt  to  reappear. 

The  pun  flashed  a  sudden  light  across  Mme.  Nourrisson's 
brain.  "  Aha !  my  dear  sir,  you  are  an  artist,  a  dramatic 
writer,  you  live  in  the  Rue  du  Helder,  you  have  kept  com- 
pany with  Madame  Antonia,  I  know  a  few  of  your  little  ways! 
Ah  !  Come,  now,  do  you  want  something  out  of  the  common 
in  the  grand  style,  Carabine  or  Mousqueton,  for  instance,  or 
Malaga  or  Jenny  Cadine  ?  " 

"  Malaga  and  Carabine,  forsooth  !  when  we  have  made  them 
what  they  are !  "  cried  Leon. 

"My  dear  Madame  Nourrisson,  I  solemnly  swear  to  you 
that  we  wanted  nothing  but  the  pleasure  of  making  your  ac- 
quaintance ;  and  as  we  wish  to  hear  about  your  antecedents, 
we  should  like  to  know  how  you  came  to  drop  into  your  way 
of  business,"  said  Bixiou. 

"  I  was  a  confidential  servant  in  the  household  of  a  marshal 
of  Fr?.nce,"  she  said,  posing  like  a  Dorine;  "he  was  the 
Prince  d'Ysembourg.  One  morning  one  of  the  finest  ladies 
at  the  Emperor's  court  came  to  speak  privately  with  the 


864  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

marshal.  I  at  once  took  care  to  be  within  hearing.  Well, 
my  countess  burst  into  tears,  and  tells  that  simpleton  of  a 
marshal  (the  Prince  d' Ysembourg,  the  Conde  of  the  Republic, 
and  a  simpleton  to  boot),  she  tells  him  that  her  husband  was 
away  at  the  wars  in  Spain,  and  had  left  her  without  a  single 
bill  for  a  thousand  francs,  and  that  unless  she  can  have  one  or 
two  at  once,  her  children  must  starve,  she  had  literally  nothing 
for  to-morrow.  Well,  my  marshal,  being  tolerably  free-handed 
in  those  days,  takes  a  couple  of  thousand-franc  notes  out  of 
his  desk.  I  watched  the  fair  countess  down  the  stairs.  She  did 
not  see  me ;  she  was  laughing  to  herself  with  not  altogether 
motherly  glee,  so  I  slipped  out  and  heard  her  tell  the  driver 
in  a  low  voice  to  drive  to  Leroy's.  I  rushed  around.  My 
mother  of  a  family  goes  to  the  famous  store  in  the  Rue  de 
Richelieu — you  know  the  place — and  orders  and  pays  for  a 
dress  that  cost  fifteen  hundred  francs.  You  used  to  pay  for 
one  dress  by  ordering  another  then.  Two  nights  afterward 
she  could  appear  at  an  ambassador's  ball,  decked  out  as  a 
woman  must  be  when  she  wishes  to  snme  for  all  the  world 
and  for  one  beside.  That  very  day  said  I  to  myself,  '  Here  is 
an  opening  for  me !  When  I  am  no  longer  young,  I  will  lend 
money  to  fine  ladies  on  their  things,;  passion  cannot  reckon, 
and  pays  blindly.'  If  it  is  a  subject  for  a  comedy  that  you 
want,  I  will  let  you  have  some  for  a  consideration — 

And  making  an  end  of  a  harangue,  colored  by  all  the  phases 
of  her  past  life,  she  departed,  leaving  Gazonal  in  dismay, 
caused  partly  by  the  matter  of  her  discourse,  but  at  least  as 
much  by  an  exhibition  of  five  yellow  teeth  which  she  meant 
for  a  smile. 

"  What  are  we  to  do  next  ?  "  he  inquired. 

"Find  some  bank-bills,"  said  Bixiou,  whistling  for  his  porter; 
"  I  want  money,  and  I  am  going  to  teach  you  the  uses  of  a 
porter.  You  imagine  that  they  are  meant  to  open  doors; 
whereas  their  real  use  is  to  help  vagrants  like  me  out  of  diffi- 
culties, and  to  assist  the  artists  whom  they  take  under  their 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS,  865 

protection,   for  which  reason   mine  will  take  the  Montyon 
prize*  some  of  these  days." 

The  common  expression,  "eyes  like  saucers,"  found  suffi- 
cient illustration  in  Gazonal's  countenance  at  that  moment. 

The  man  that  suddenly  appeared  in  the  doorway  was  of  no 
particular  age,  a  something  between  a  private  detective  and  a 
merchant's  clerk,  but  more  unctuous  and  sleeker  than  either ; 
his  hair  was  greasy,  his  person  paunchy,  his  complexion  of 
the  moist  and  unwholesome  kind  that  you  observe  in  the 
superiors  of  convents.  He  wore  a  blue  cloth  jacket,  drab 
trousers,  and  list  slippers. 

"What  do  you  want,  sir?"  inquired  this  personage,  with 
a  half-patronizing,  half-servile  manner. 

"Oh,  Ravenouillet — (his  name  is  Ravenouillet),"  said  Bix- 
iou,  turning  to  Gazonal — "have  you  your  'notes  receivable* 
about  you?" 

Ravenouillet  felt  in  a  side-pocket,  and  produced  the  stick- 
iest book  that  Gazonal  had  ever  seen  in  his  life. 

"Just  enter  a  note  of  these  two  notes  for  five  hundred 
francs  at  three  months,  and  put  your  name  to  them  for  me." 

Bixiou  brought  out  a  couple  of  notes  made  payable  to  his 
order  as  he  spoke.  Ravenouillet  accepted  them  forthwith, 
and  noted  them  down  on  the  greasy  page  among  his  wife's 
entries  of  various  sums  due  from  other  lodgers. 

"Thanks,  Ravenouillet.  Stay,  here  is  an  order  for  the 
Vaudeville." 

"  Ah,  my  child  will  enjoy  herself  very  much  to-night,"  said 
Ravenouillet,  as  he  went  away 

"  There  are  seventy-one  of  us  in  the  house,"  said  Bixiou, 
"  among  us,  on  an  average,  we  owe  Ravenouillet  six  thousand 
francs  per  month,  eighteen  thousand  francs  per  quarter  for 
advances  and  postage,  to  say  nothing  of  rent.  He  is  oui 
Providence— at  thirty  per  cent.  We  pay  him  that  without 
being  so  much  as  asked." 

*  Awarded  annually  for  faithful  service. 


366  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"Oh,  Paris  !  Paris  !  "  exclaimed  Gazonal. 

"On  the  way,"  said  Bixiou,  filling  in  his  signature  "(for 
I  am  going  to  show  you  another  actor,  Cousin  Gazonal,  and  a 
charming  scene  he  shall  play,  gratis,  for  you) " 

"  Where  ?  "  Gazonal  broke  in. 

"In  a  money-lender's  office.  On  the  way,  I  repeat,  I  will 
tell  you  how  friend  Ravenouillet  started  in  Paris." 

As  they  passed  the  door  of  the  lodge,  Gazonal  heard  Mile. 
Lucienne  Ravenouillet,  a  student  at  the  Conservatoire,  prac- 
ticing her  scales,  her  father  was  reading  the  newspaper,  and 
Mme.  Ravenouillet  came  out  with  letters  in  her  hand  for  the 
lodgers  above. 

"Thank  you  for  the  order,  Monsieur  Bixiou,"  called  the 
little  one. 

"  That  is  not  a  '  rat,'  "  said  Leon  ;  "  it  is  a  grasshopper  in 
the  larva  state." 

"It  seems  that  here,  as  all  the  world  over,  you  win  the 
favor  of  those  in  office  by  good  offices,"  began  Gazonal. 
Leon  was  charmed  with  the  pun. 

"  He  is  coming  on  in  our  society  !  "  he  cried. 

"Now  for  Ravenouillet's  history,"  said  Bixiou,  when  the 
three  stood  outside  on  the  boulevard.  "  In  1831,  Massoi 
(your  chairman  of  committee,  Gazonal)  was  a  journalist- 
barrister.  At  that  time  he  merely  intended  to  be  keeper  of 
the  seals  some  day ;  he  scorned  to  oust  Louis-Philippe  from 
the  throne :  pardon  his  ambition,  he  comes  from  Carcassonne. 
One  fine  morning  a  young  fellow-countryman  turned  up. 
'  Monsu  Massoi,'  he  said,  '  you  know  me  very  well,  my  father 
is  your  neighbor  the  grocer ;  I  have  just  come  from  down 
yonder,  for  they  tell  us  that  every  one  who  comes  here  gets  a 
place.'  At  those  words  a  cold  shiver  ran  through  Massoi. 
He  thought  within  himself  that  if  he  were  so  ill  advised  as  to 
oblige  a  compatriot,  who  for  that  matter  was  a  perfect  stranger, 
he  should  have  the  whole  department  tumbling  in  upon  him. 
He  thought  of  the  wear  and  tear  to  bell-pulls,  door  hinges, 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  867 

and  carpets,  he  saw  his  only  servant  giving  notice,  he  had 
visions  of  trouble  with  his  landlord,  of  complaints  from  the 
other  tenants  of  the  combined  odors  of  garlic  and  diligence 
introduced  into  the  house.  So  he  fixed  upon  his  petitioner 
such  an  eye  as  a  butcher  turns  upon  a  sheep  brought  into  the 
shambles.  In  vain.  His  fellow-countryman  survived  that 
gaze,  or  rather  that  stab,  and  continued  his  discourse  much  on 
this  wise,  according  to  Massol's  report  of  it: 

"  'I  have  my  ambitions,  like  every  one  else,'  said  he;  'I 
shall  not  go  back  again  until  I  am  rich,  if  indeed  I  go  back 
at  all,  for  Paris  is  the  antechamber  of  Paradise.  They  tell 
me  that  you  write  for  the  newspapers,  and  do  anything  you 
like  with  people  here,  and  that  for  you  it  is  ask  and  have  with 
the  Government.  I  have  abilities,  like  all  of  us  down  yonder, 
but  I  know  myself :  I  ha^e  no  education ;  I  cannot  write 
(which  is  a  pity,  for  I  have  ideas)  ;  so  I  do  not  think  of  com- 
ing into  competition  with  you ;  I  know  myself;  I  should  not 
make  anything  out.  But  since  you  can  do  anything,  and  we 
are  brothers,  as  you  may  say,  having  played  together  as  chil- 
dren, I  count  upon  you  to  give  me  a  start  in  life,  and  to  use 
your  influence  for  me.  Oh,  you  must.  I  want  a  place,  the 
kind  of  place  to  suit  my  talents,  a  place  that  I,  being  I,  am 
fitted  to  fill,  with  a  chance  of  making  my  fortune ' 

"  Massol  was  just  on  the  point  of  brutally  thrusting  his 
fellow-countryman  out  at  the  door  with  a  rough  word  in  his 
ear,  when  the  said  countryman  concluded  thus : 

"  '  So  I  do  not  ask  for  a  place  in  the  civil  service,  where  a 
man  gets  on  as  slowly  as  a  tortoise ;  for  there  is  your  cousin 
that  has  been  a  tax-collector  these  twenty  years,  and  is  a  tax- 
collector  still — no;  I  simply  thought  of  going ?'  'On 

the  stage?  '  put  in  Massol,  greatly  relieved  by  the  turn  things 
were  taking.  '  No.  It  is  true,  I  have  the  figure  for  it,  and 
the  memory,  and  the  gesticulation ;  but  it  takes  too  much  out 
of  you.  I  should  prefer  the  career  of  a— janitor. '  Massol  kept 
his  countenance— 'It  will  take  far  more  out  of  you,'  he  said, 


368  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

'but  you  are  not  so  likely,  at  any  rate,  to  perform  to  an 
empty  house.'  So  he  found  Ravenouillet's  'first-door-string' 
for  him,  as  he  says." 

"  I  was  the  first  to  take  an  interest  in  janitors  as  a  class," 
said  Leon.  "Your  moral  humbugs,  your  charlatans  from 
vanity,  your  latter-day  sycophants,  your  Septembrists  dis- 
guised in  trappings  of  decorous  solemnity,  your  discoverers  of 
problems  palpitating  with  present  importance,  are  all  preach- 
ing the  emancipation  of  the  negro,  the  improvement  of  the 
juvenile  offender,  and  philanthropic  efforts  on  behalf  of  the 
ticket-of-leave  man  ;  while  they  leave  their  janitors  in  a  worse 
plight  than  the  Irish,  living  in  dens  more  loathsome  than 
dark  cells,  upon  a  scantier  pittance  than  the  Government 
grants  per  head  for  convicts.  I  have  done  but  one  good  deed 
in  my  life,  and  that  is  my  porter's  lodge." 

"Yes,"  said  Bixiou.  "  Suppose  that  a  man  has  built  a  set 
of  huge  cages,  divided  up  like  a  beehive  or  a  menagerie,  into 
hundreds  of  cells  or  dens,  in  which  living  creatures  of  every 
species  are  intended  to  ply  their  various  industries;  suppose 
that  this  animal,  with  the  face  of  an  owner  of  house-property, 
should  come  to  a  man  of  science  and  say — '  Sir,  I  want  a  speci- 
men of  the  order  JBtmana,  which  will  live  in  a  sink  ten  feet 
square,  filled  with  old  boots  and  plague-stricken  rags.  I  want 
him  to  live  in  it  all  his  life,  and  rear  a  family  of  children  as 
pretty  as  cherubs;  he  must  use  it  as  a  workshop,  kitchen,  and 
promenade ;  he  must  sing  and  grow  flowers  in  it,  and  never  go 
out ;  he  must  shut  his  eyes,  and  yet  see  everything  that  goes 
on  in  the  house.'  Assuredly  the  man  of  science  could  not  in- 
vent the  janitor;  Paris  alone,  or  the  devil  if  you  like  to  have 
it  so,  was  equal  to  the  feat." 

"  Parisian  industrialism  has  gone  even  further  into  the  re- 
gions of  the  Impossible,"  added  Gazonal.  "You  in  Paris 
exhibit  all  kinds  of  manufactures ;  but  there  are  by-products 
of  which  you  really  know  nothing.  There  are  your  working 
classes.  They  bear  the  brunt  of  competition  with  foreign  in- 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  369 

dustries,  hardship  against  hardship,  just  as  the  regiments  bore 
the  brunt  of  Napoleon's  duel  with  Europe." 

"  Here  we  are.  This  is  where  our  friend  Vauvinet  lives," 
said  Bixiou.  "  People  who  paint  contemporary  manners  are 
too  apt  to  copy  old  portraits;  it  is  one  of  their  greatest  mis- 
takes. In  our  own  time  every  calling  has  been  transformed. 
Tradesmen  are  peers  of  France,  artists  are  capitalists,  writers 
of  vaudevilles  have  money  in  the  Funds.  Some  few  figures  re- 
main as  before  ;  but,  generally  speaking,  most  professions  have 
dropped  their  manners  and  customs  along  with  their  distinc- 
tive dress.  Gobseck,  Gigonnet,  Chaboisseau,  and  Samanon 
were  the  last  of  the  Romans ;  to-day  we  rejoice  in  the  posses- 
sion of  our  Vauvinet,  the  good  fellow,  the  dandy-denizen  of 
the  greenroom,  the  frequenter  of  the  society  of  lorettes,  the 
owner  of  a  neat  little  one-horse  brougham.  Watch  my  man 
carefully,  friend  Gazonal,  and  you  shall  see  a  comedy  of 
money.  First:  the  cool,  indifferent  man  that  will  not  give  a 
penny;  and  second  :  the  hot  and  eager  man  smelling  a  profit. 
Of  all  things,  listen  to  him." 

With  that,  the  three  mounted  to  a  third-floor  lodging  in  a 
very  fine  house  on  the  Boulevard  des  Italiens,  and  at  once 
found  themselves  amid  elegant  surroundings  in  the  height  of 
the  fashion.  A  young  man  of  eight-and-twenty,  or  thereabout, 
came  forward  almost  laughingly  at  sight  of  Leon  de  Lora, 
held  out  a  hand  to  all  appearance  in  the  friendliest  possible 
way  to  Bixiou,  gave  Gazonal  a  distant  bow,  and  brought  the 
three  into  his  private  office.  All  the  man's  bourgeois  tastes 
lurked  beneath  the  artistic  decorations  of  the  room  in  spite  of 
the  unimpeachable  statuettes  and  numberless  trifles  appro- 
priated to  the  uses  of  Parisian  petits  apparicments*  by  modern 
art,  grown  petty  to  supply  the  demand.  Like  most,  young 
men  of  business,  Vauvinet  was  extremely  and  carefully 
dressed,  a  man's  clothes  being  as  it  were  a  kind  of  prospectus 

among  them. 

*  Small  suites  of  rooms. 
24 


370  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"  I  have  come  to  you  for  money,"  said  Bixiou,  laughing  as 
he  held  out  his  bills. 

Vauvinet's  countenance  immediately  grew  so  grave  that 
Gazonal  was  amused  at  the  difference  between  the  smiles  of  a 
minute  ago  and  the  professional  bill-discounting  visage  he 
turned  on  Bixiou. 

"  I  would  oblige  you  with  the  greatest  pleasure,  my  dear 
fellow,"  said  he,  "  but  I  have  no  cash  at  the  moment." 

"Oh,  pshaw!  " 

"  No.  I  have  paid  it  all  away,  you  know  where.  Poor  old 
Lousteau  is  going  to  run  a  theatre.  He  has  gone  into  part- 
nership with  an  ancient  playwright  that  stands  very  well  with 
the  Ministry — Ridal,  his  name  is — they  wanted  thirty  thou- 
sand francs  of  me  yesterday.  I  am  drained  dry,  so  dry  indeed 
that  I  am  just  about  to  borrow  a  hundred  louis  of  Cerizet  to 
pay  for  my  losses  this  morning  at  lansquenet,  at  Jenny  Ca- 
dine's." 

"  You  must  be  drained  dry  indeed  if  you  cannot  oblige  poor 
Bixiou,"  put  in  Leon  de  Lora,  "for  he  can  say  very  nasty 
things  when  he  is  driven  to  it." 

"  I  can  only  speak  well  of  a  man  so  well  off,"  said  Bixiou, 
in  return. 

"  My  dear  fellow,  even  if  I  had  the  money,  it  would  be 
quite  impossible  to  discount  bills  accepted  by  your  porter, 
even  at  fifty  percent.  There  is  no  demand  for  Ravenouillet's 
paper.  He  is  not  exactly  Rothschild.  I  warn  you  that  this 
sort  of  thing  is  played  out.  You  ought  to  try  another  firm. 
Look  up  an  uncle,  for  the  friend  that  will  back  your  bills  is 
extinct,  materialism  is  so  frightfully  on  the  increase." 

Bixiou  turned  to  Gazonal. 

"I  have  a  friend  here,"  he  said,  "one  of  the  best  known 
cloth  manufacturers  in  the  South.  His  name  is  Gazonal.  His 
hair  wants  cutting,"  continued  Bixiou,  surveying  the  provin- 
cial's luxuriant  and  somewhat  disheveled  crop,  "but  I  am 
just  about  to  take  him  to  Marius,  and  his  resemblance  to  a 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  371 

poodle,  so  deleterious  to  his  credit  and  ours,  will  presently 
disappear." 

"A  southern  name  is  not  good  enough  for  me,  without 
offense  to  this  gentleman  be  it  said,"  returned  Vauvinet,  and 
Gazonal  was  so  much  relieved  that  he  passed  over  the  inso- 
lence of  the  remark.  Being  extremely  acute,  he  thought  that 
Bixiou  and  the  painter  meant  to  make  him  pay  a  thousand 
francs  for  the  breakfast  at  the  Cafe  de  Paris  by  way  of  teaching 
him  to  know  the  town.  He  had  not  yet  gotten  rid  of  the  sus- 
picion in  which  the  provincial,  visiting  the  city,  always  in- 
trenches himself. 

"  How  should  I  do  business  in  the  Pyrenees,  six  hundred 
miles  away  ?  "  added  Vauvinet. 

41  So  there  is  no  more  to  be  said  ?  "  returned  Bixiou. 

"I  have  twenty  francs  at  home." 

"I  am  sorry  for  you,"  said  the  author  of  the  hoax.  "I 
thought  I  was  worth  a  thousand  francs,"  he  added  drily. 

"  You  are  worth  a  hundred  thousand  francs,"  Vauvinet  re- 
joined ;  "sometimes  you  are  even  beyond  all  price — but  I  am 
drained  dry." 

"  Oh,  well,  we  will  say  no  more  about  it.  I  had  contrived 
as  good  a  bit  of  business  as  you  could  wish  at  Carabine's  to- 
night— do  you  know?" 

Vauvinet's  answer  was  a  wink.  So  does  one  dealer  in  horse- 
flesh convey  to  another  the  information  that  he  is  not  to  be 
deceived. 

11  You  have  forgotten  how  you  took  me  by  the  waist,  exactly 
as  if  I  were  a  pretty  young  woman,  and  said  with  coaxing 
words  and  looks,  <  I  will  do  anything  for  you,  if  only  you  will 
get  me  shares  at  par  in  this  railway  that  du  Tillet  and  Nucingen 
are  bringing  out,'  said  you.  Very  well,  my  dear  fellow,  Maxima 
and  Nucingen  are  coming  to-night  to  meet  several  political 
folk  at  Carabine's.  You  are  losing  a  fine  chance,  old  man. 
Come.  Good-day,  dabbler." 

And  Bixiou  rose  to  go,  leaving  Vauvinet  to  all  appearance 


372  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

indifferent,  but  in  reality  as  vexed  as  a  man  can  be  with  him- 
self after  a  blunder  of  his  own  making. 

"  One  moment,  my  dear  fellow.  I  have  credit  if  I  have  no 
cash.  If  I  can  get  nothing  for  your  bills,  I  can  keep  them 
till  they  fall  due,  and  give  you  other  bills  in  exchange  from 
my  portfolio.  After  all,  we  might  possibly  come  to  an  under- 
standing about  those  railway  shares ;  we  could  divide  the 
profits  in  a  certain  proportion,  and  I  would  give  you  a  draft 
on  myself  on  account  of  the  prof " 

"  No,  no,"  returned  Bixiou,  "  I  must  have  money;  I  must 
cash  my  Ravenouillet  elsewhere " 

"And  Ravenouillet  is  a  good  man,"  resumed  Vauvinet; 
"  he  has  an  account  at  the  savings  bank  ;  a  very  good  man " 

"  Better  than  you  are,"  said  Leon  ;  "  he  has  no  rent  to 
pay  he  does  not  squander  his  money  on  lorettes,  nor  does  he 
rush  into  speculation  and  shake  in  his  shoes  with  every  rise 
and  fall." 

"You  are  pleased  to  laugh,  great  man.  You  have  given 
us  the  quintessence  of  La  Fontaine's  fable  of  the  '  Oak  and 
the  Reed,'  "  said  Vauvinet,  grown  jovial  and  insinuating  all 
at  once.  "  Come,  Gubetta,  my  old  fellow-conspirator,  he 
continued,  taking  Bixiou  by  the  waist,  "  you  want  money,  do 
you  ?  Very  well,  I  may  just  as  well  borrow  three  as  two 
thousand  francs  of  my  friend  Cerizet.  And  '  Cinna,  let  us  be 

friends !  ' Hand  us  over  those  two  leaves  that  grow 

from  the  root  of  all  evil.  If  I  refused  at  first,  it  was  because 
it  is  very  hard  on  a  man  that  can  only  do  his  bit  of  business 
by  passing  on  bills  to  the  bank  to  make  him  keep  your  Rave- 
nouillets  locked  up  in  the  drawer  of  his  desk.  It  is  hard ; 
very  hard " 

"What  discount?" 

"Next  to  nothing,"  said  Vauvinet.  "At  three  months  it 
will  cost  you  a  miserable  fifty  francs." 

"You  shall  be  my  benefactor,  as  Emile  Blondet  used  to 
say." 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  373 

"  It  is  borrowing  money  at  twenty  per  cent,  per  annum, 

interest  included "  Gazonal  began  in  a  whisper,  but  for 

all  answer  he  received  a  blow  from  Bixiou's  elbow  directed  at 
his  windpipe. 

"  I  say,"  said  Vauvinet,  opening  a  drawer,  "  I  perceive  an 
odd  note  for  five  hundred  francs  sticking  to  the  cloth.  I  did 
not  know  I  was  so  rich.  I  was  looking  for  a  bill  to  offer  you. 
I  have  one  almost  due  for  four  hundred  and  fifty.  Cerizet 
will  take  it  off  you  for  a  trifle;  and  that  makes  up  the  amount. 
But  no  tricks,  Bixiou.  I  am  going  to  Carabine's  to-night, 
eh  ?  Will  you  swear ?  " 

"Are*we  not  friends  again?"  asked  Bixiou,  taking  the 
banknote  and  the  bill.  "  I  give  you  my  word  of  honor  that 
you  shall  meet  du  Tillet  to-night  and  plenty  of  others  that 
have  a  mind  to  make  their  (rail)way." 

Vauvinet  came  out  upon  the  landing  with  the  three  friends, 
cajoling  Bixiou  to  the  last. 

Bixiou  listened  with  much  seriousness  while  Gazonal  on  the 
way  downstairs  tried  to  open  his  eyes  to  the  nature  of  the 
transaction  just  completed.  Gazonal  proved  to  him  that  if 
Cerizet,  this  crony  of  Vauvinet's,  charged  no  more  than 
twenty  francs  for  discounting  a  bill  for  four  hundred  and  fifty 
francs,  then  he  (Bixiou)  was  borrowing  money  at  the  rate  of 
forty  per  cent,  per  annum. 

Out  upon  the  pavement  Bixiou  burst  into  a  laugh,  the 
laugh  of  a  Parisian  over  a  successful  hoax,  a  soundless,  joyless 
chuckle,  a  labial  northeaster  which  froze  Gazonal  into  silence. 

"  The  grant  of  the  concession  to  the  railway  will  be  post- 
poned at  the  Chamber,"  he  said  j  "we  knew  that  yesterday 
from  the  marcheuse  whom  we  met  just  now.  And  if  I  win 
five  or  six  thousand  francs  at  lansquenet,  what  is  a  loss  of 
sixty  or  seventy  francs  so  long  as  you  have  something  to 
stake?" 

"  Lansquenet  is  another  of  the  thousand  facets  of  Paris  life 
to-day,"  said  Leon.  "Wherefore,  cousin,  count  upon  our 


374  THE  UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

introducing  you  to  one  of  the  duchesses  of  the  Rue  Saint 
Georges.  In  her  house  you  see  the  aristocracy  of  lorettes, 
and  may  perhaps  gain  your  lawsuit.  But  you  cannot  possibly 
show  yourself  with  that  Pyrenean  crop,  you  look  like  a  hedge- 
hog ;  we  will  take  you  to  Marius,  close  by  in  the  Place  de  la 
Bourse.  He  is  another  of  our  mummers." 

"  What  is  the  new  mummer?  " 

"Here  comes  the  anecdote,"  said  Bixiou.  "In  1800  a 
young  wigmaker  named  Cabot  came  from  Toulouse,  and  set 
up  shop  (to  use  your  jargon)  in  Paris.  This  genius — he 
retired  afterward  with  an  income  of  twenty  thousand  francs 
to  Libourne — this  genius,  consumed  with  ambition,  saw  that 
the  name  of  Cabot  could  never  be  famous.  Monsieur  Parny, 
whom  he  attended  professionally,  called  him  Marius,  a  name 
infinitely  superior  to  the  'Armands'  and  'Hippolytes' 
beneath  which  other  victims  of  that  hereditary  complaint 
endeavor  to  conceal  the  patronymic.  All  Cabot's  successors 
have  been  named  Marius.  The  present  Marius  is  Marius  V.; 
his  family  name  is  Mougin.  This  is  the  way  with  many  trades, 
with  Eau  de  Botot,  for  example,  and  La  Petite-Vertu's  ink. 
In  Paris,  a  man's  name  becomes  a  part  of  the  business,  and 
at  length  confers  a  certain  status;  the  signboard  ennobles. 
Marius  left  pupils  behind  him,  too,  and  created  (it  is  said) 
the  first  school  of  hairdressing  in  the  world." 

"  I  noticed  before  this  as  I  traveled  across  France  a  great 
many  names  upon  signboards — So-and-so,  FROM  MARIUS." 

"All  his  pupils  are  bound  to  wash  their  hands  after  each 
customer,"  continued  Bixiou;  "and  Marius  will  not  take 
every  one,  a  pupil  must  have  a  shapely  hand  and  tolerably 
good  looks.  The  most  remarkable  of  these,  for  figure  or 
eloquence,  are  sent  out  to  people's  houses  ;  Marius  only  puts 
himself  about  for  titled  ladies.  He  has  a  cab  and  a  '  groom.' ' 

"But,  after  all,  he  is  only  a  barber  (merlan)"  Gazonal 
cried  indignantly. 

"  A  barber  !  "  repeated  Bixiou.     "  You  must  know  that  he  is 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  C73 

a  captain  in  the  National  Guard,  and  wears  the  cross  because 
he  was  the  first  to  leap  a  barricade  in  1832." 

"  Be  careful.  He  is  neither  a  hairdresser  nor  a  wigmaker; 
he  is  the  manager  of  salons  de  coiffure"  (tonsorial  parlors), 
said  L6on  on  the  sumptuously  carpeted  staircase  between  the 
mahogany  hand-rails  and  cut-glass  balusters. 

"And,  look  here,  do  not  disgrace  us,"  added  Bixiou. 
"The  lackeys  in  the  antechamber  will  take  off  your  coat 
and  hat  to  brush  them,  open  the  door  of  the  salon  and  close 
it  after  you.  Which  is  worth  knowing,  my  friend  Gazonal," 
Bixiou  continued  slyly,  "  or  you  might  cry  4  Thieves ! '  " 

"The  three  salons  are  three  boudoirs,"  said  L^on ;  "the 
manager  has  filled  them  with  all  that  modern  luxury  can 
devise.  There  are  fringed  lambrequins  over  the  windows, 
flower-stands  everywhere,  and  silken  couches,  on -which  you 
await  your  turn  and  read  the  newspapers  if  all  the  dressing- 
rooms  are  occupied.  As  you  come  in,  you  begin  to  finger  your 
waistcoat  pockets,  and  imagine  that  they  will  charge  you  five 
francs  at  least ;  but  no  pocket  is  mulcted  of  more  than  half 
a  franc  if  the  hair  is  curled,  or  a  franc  if  the  hairdresser  cuts 
it.  Elegant  toilet-tables  stand  among  the  flowers,  there  are 
jets  of  water  playing,  you  see  yourself  reflected  everywhere  in 
huge  mirrors.  So  try  to  look  as  if  you  were  used  to  it. 
When  the  client  comes  in  CMarius  uses  the  elegant  term 
'  client '  instead  of  the  common  word  '  customer  '),  when 
the  client  appears  on  the  threshold,  Manus  appraises  him  at  a 
glance ;  for  him  you  are  '  a  head  '  more  or  less  worthy  of  his 
interest.  From  Marius'  point  of  view,  there  are  no  men — 
only  heads." 

"We  will  tune  Marius  to  concert-pitch  for  you,"  said 
Bixiou,  "  if  you  will  follow  our  lead." 

When  Gazonal  appeared  upon  the  scene,  Marius  at  once 
gave  him  an  approving  glance.  "  Regulus !  "  cried  he, 
"  take  this  head.  Clip  with  the  small  shears  first  of  all." 

At   a   sign    from    Bixiou,   Gazonal    turned   to   the   pupil. 


376        .  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"Pardon- me,"  he  said,  "I  wish  to  have  Monsieur  Marius 
himself." 

Greatly  flattered  by  this  speech,  Marius  came  forward, 
leaving  the  head  on  which  he  was  engaged. 

"I  am  at  your  service,  I  am  just  at  an  end.  Be  quite 
easy,  my  pupil  will  prepare  you,  I  myself  will  decide  on  the 
style." 

Marius,  a  little  man,  his  face  seamed  with  the  smallpox, 
his  hair  frizzed  after  Rubini's  fashion,  was  dressed  in  black 
from  head  to  foot.  He  wore  white  cuffs  and  a  diamond  in 
his  shirt-frill.  He  recognized  Bixiou,  and  saluted  him  as  an 
equal  power. 

"A  commonplace  head,"  he  remarked  to  Leon,  indicating 
the  subject  under  his  fingers,  "  a  philistine.  But  what  can 
one  do?  If  one  lived  by  art  alone,  one  would  end  raving 
mad  at  Bicetre  "  (a  lunatic  asylum).  And  he  returned  to  his 
client  with  an  inimitable  gesture  and  a  parting  injunction  to 
Regulus,  "  Be  careful  with  that  gentleman,  he  is  evidently  an 
artist." 

"A  journalist,"  said  Bixiou. 

At  that  word  Marius  passed  the  comb  two  or  three  times 
over  the  "commonplace  head,"  swooped  down  upon  Gazonal 
just  as  the  small  shears  were  brought  into  play,  and  caught 
Regulus  by  the  arm  with — 

"I  will  take  this  gentleman.  Look,  see  yourself  in  the 
large  mirror,  sir  (if  the  glass  can  stand  it),"  he  said,  address- 
ing the  relinquished  philistine.  "  Ossian  !  " 

A  lackey  came  in  and  carried  off  the  "client." 

"Pay  at  the  desk,  sir,"  said  Marius,  as  the  bewildered 
customer  drew  out  his  purse. 

"  Is  it  any  use,  my  dear  fellow,  to  proceed  to  this  operation 
with  the  small  shears?  "  asked  Bixiou. 

"  A  head  never  comes  under  my  hands  until  it  has  been 
brushed,"  said  the  great  man  ;  "but  on  your  account  I  will 
take  this  gentleman  from  beginning  to  end.  The  blocking 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  377 

out  I  leave  to  my  pupils,  I  do  not  care  to  take  it.  Every- 
body, like  you,  is  for  '  Monsieur  Marius  himself; '  I  can  only 
give  the  finishing  touches.  For  what  paper  does  monsieur 
write?" 

"In  your  place  I  would  have  three  or  four  editions  of 
Marius." 

"Ah!  monsieur  is  a  feuilletoniste  (gossip  writer),  I  see," 
said  Marius.  "Unluckily,  a  hairdresser  must  do  his  work 
himself,  it  cannot  be  done  by  a  deputy Pardon  me." 

He  left  Gazonal  to  give  an  eye  to  Regulus,  now  engaged 
with  a  newly  arrived  head,  and  made  a  disapproving  comment 
thereon,  an  inarticulate  sound  produced  by  tongue  and  palate, 
which  may  be  rendered  thus — "  titt,  titt,  titt." 

"  Goodness  gracious  !  come  now,  that  is  not  broad  enough, 

your  scissors  are  leaving  furrows  behind  them Stay  a  bit ; 

look  here,  Regulus,  you  are  not  clipping  poodles,  but  men — 
men  with  characters  of  their  own  ;  and  if  you  continue  to 
gaze  at  the  ceiling  instead  of  dividing  your  attention  between 
the  glass  and  the  face,  you  will  be  a  disgrace  to  '  my  house.' ' 

"  You  are  severe,  Monsieur  Marius." 

"  I  must  do  my  duty  by  them,  and  teach  them  the  mysteries 
of  the  art " 

"Then  it  is  an  art,  is  it?" 

Marius  stopped  in  indignation,  the  scissors  in  one  hand, 
the  comb  in  the  other,  and  contemplated  Gazonal  in  the 
glass. 

"  Monsieur,  you  talk  like  a  child.  And  yet,  from 

your  accent,  you  seem  to  come  from  the  South,  the  land  of 
men  of  genius." 

"Yes.  It  requires  taste  of  a  kind,  I  know,"  returned 
Gazonal. 

"  Pray  say  no  more,  monsieur !  I  looked  for  better  things 
from  you.  I  mean  to  say  that  a  hairdresser  (I  do  not  say  a 
good  hairdresser,  for  one  is  either  a  hairdresser  or  one  is  not\ 
a  hairdresser  is  not  so  easily  found  as— what  shall  I  say?— 


378  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

as — I  really  hardly  know — as  a  Minister — (sit  still)  no,  that 
will  not  do,  for  you  cannot  judge  of  the  value  of  a  Minister, 
the  streets  are  full  of  them.  A  Paganini  ? — no,  that  will  not 
quite  do.  A  hairdresser,  monsieur,  a  man  that  can  read  your 
character  and  your  habits,  must  have  that  in  him  which  makes 
a  philosopher.  And  for  the  women  !  But  there,  women  ap- 
preciate us,  they  know  our  value ;  they  know  that  their  tri- 
umphs are  due  to  us  when  they  come  to  us  to  prepare  them 

for  conquest which  is  to  say  that  a  hairdresser  is— but 

no  one  knows  what  he  is.  I  myself,  for  instance,  you  will 
scarcely  find  a — well,  without  boasting,  people  know  what  I 
am.  Ah  !  well,  no,  I  think  there  should  be  a  better  yet. 
Execution,  that  is  the  thing !  Ah,  if  women  would  but 
give  me  a  free  hand  ;  if  I  could  but  carry  out  all  the  ideas  that 
occur  to  me ! — for  I  have  a  tremendous  imagination,  you  see 
— but  women  will  not  cooperate  with  you,  they  have  notions 
of  their  own,  they  will  run  their  fingers  or  their  combs  through 
the  exquisite  creations  that  ought  to  be  engraved  and  recorded, 
for  our  works  only  live  for  a  few  hours,  you  see,  sir.  Ah !  a 
great  hairdresser  should  be  something  like  what  Careme  and 
Vestris  are  in  their  lines.  (Your  head  this  way,  if  you  please, 
I  am  catching  the  expression.  That  will  do.)  Bunglers,  in- 
capable of  understanding  their  epoch  or  their  art,  are  the  ruin 
of  our  profession.  They  deal  in  wigs,  for  instance,  or  hair- 
restorers,  and  think  of  nothing  but  selling  you  a  bottle  of 
stuff,  making  a  trade  of  the  profession ;  it  makes  one  sorry  to 
see  it.  The  wretches  cut  your  hair  and  brush  it  anyhow. 
Now,  when  I  came  here  from  Toulouse,  it  was  my  ambition 
to  succeed  to  the  great  Marius,  to  be  a  true  Marius,  and  in 
my  person  to  add  such  lustre  to  the  name  as  it  had  not  known 
with  the  other  four.  '  Victory  or  death  ! '  said  I  to  myself. 
(Sit  up,  I  have  nearly  finished.)  I  was  the  first  to  aim  at 
elegance.  My  salons  excited  curiosity.  I  scorn  advertise- 
ments; I' spend  the  cost  of  advertisements  on  comfort,  mon- 
sieur, on  improvements.  Next  year  I  shall  have  a  quartette 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  379 

in  a  little  salon ;  I  shall  have  music,  and  the  best  music.  Yes, 
one  must  beguile  the  tedium  of  the  time  spent  in  the  dressing- 
room.  I  do  not  shut  my  eyes  to  the  unpleasant  aspects  of  the 
operation.  (Look  at  yourself.)  A  visit  to  the  hairdresser 
is,  perhaps,  quite  as  tiring  as  sitting  for  a  portrait.  Monsieur 
knows  the  famous  Monsieur  de  Humboldt  ?  (I  managed  to 
make  the  most  of  the  little  hair  that  America  spared  to  him, 
for  science  has  this  much  in  common  with  the  savage — she  is 
sure  to  scalp  her  man.)  Well,  the  great  man  said,  as  monsieur 
perhaps  knows,  that  if  it  was  painful  to  go  to  be  hanged,  it 
was  only  less  painful  to  sit  for  your  portrait.  I  myself  am  of 
the  opinion  of  a  good  many  women,  that  a  visit  to  the  hair- 
dresser is  more  trying  than  a  visit  to  the  studio.  Well,  mon- 
sieur, I  want  people  to  come  here  for  pleasure.  (You  have  a 
rebellious  tuft  of  hair.)  A  Jew  suggested  Italian  opera-singers 
to  pluck  out  the  gray  hairs  of  young  fellows  of  forty  in  the 
intervals ;  but  his  signoras  turned  out  to  be  young  persons 
from  the  Conservatoire,  or  pianoforte  teachers  from  the  Rue 
Montmartre.  Now,  monsieur,  your  hair  is  worthy  of  a  man 
of  talent.  Ossian  !  "  (to  the  lackey  in  livery)  "brush  this 
gentleman's  coat,  and  go  to  the  door  with  him.  Who  comes 
next?"  he  added  majestically,  glancing  round  a  group  of 
customers  waiting  for  their  turn. 

"  Do  not  laugh,  Gazonal,"  said  L£on  as  they  reached  the 
foot  of  the  stairs.  "  I  can  see  one  of  our  great  men  down 
yonder,"  he  continued,  exploring  the  Place  de  la  Bourse  with 
his  eyes.  "  You  shall  have  an  opportunity  of  making  a  com- 
parison ;  when  you  have  heard  him  talk,  you  shall  tell  me 
which  is  the  queerer  of  the  two — he  or  the  hairdresser." 

" '  Do  not  laugh,  Gazonal,' "  added  Bixiou,  imitating 
Leon's  manner.  "  What  is  Marius'  business,  do  you  think?  " 

"  He  is  a  hairdresser." 

"  He  has  gradually  made  a  monopoly  of  the  wholesale  trade 
in  human  hair,  just  as  the  provision  dealer  of  whom  we  shall 
shortly  buy  a  Strasbourg  pie  for  three  francs  has  the  truffle 


380  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

trade  entirely  in  his  hands.  He  discounts  bills  in  his  line  of 
business,  he  lends  money  to  customers  at  a  pinch,  he  deals  in 
annuities,  he  speculates  on  'Change,  he  is  a  shareholder  in  all 
the  fashion  papers  ;  and  finally,  under  the  name  of  a  chemist, 
he  sells  an  abominable  drug  which  brings  him  in  thirty  thou- 
sand francs  per  annum  as  his  share  of  the  profits,  and  costs  a 
hundred  thousand  francs  in  advertisements." 

"  Is  it  possible  ?  " 

"Bear  this  in  mind,"  Bixiou  replied  with  gravity,  "in 
Paris  there  is  no  such  thing  as  a  small  trade  ;  everything  here 
is  done  on  a  large  scale,  be  it  frippery  or  matches.  The  bar- 
keeper standing  with  a  napkin  under  his  arm  to  watch  you 
enter  his  saloon  very  likely  has  an  income  of  fifty  thousand 
francs  from  investments  in  the  Funds.  The  waiter  has  a  vote, 
and  may  offer  himself  for  election ;  a  man  whom  you  might 
take  for  a  beggar  in  the  street  carries  a  hundred  thousand 
francs'  worth  of  unmounted  diamonds  in  his  waistcoat  pocket, 
and  does  not  steal  them." 

The  three,  inseparable  for  that  day  at  least,  were  piloted 
by  L£on  de  Lora  in  such  sort  that  at  the  corner  of  the  Rue 
Vivienne  they  ran  against  a  man  of  forty  or  thereabout  with  a 
ribbon  in  his  button-hole. 

"My  dear  Dubourdieu,  what  are  you  dreaming  about? 
Some  beautiful  allegorical  composition?"  asked  Leon.  "My 
dear  cousin,  I  have  the  pleasure  of  introducing  you  to  the 
well-known  painter  Dubourdieu,  celebrated  no  less  for  his 
genius  than  for  his  humanitarian  convictions.  Dubourdieu, 
my  cousin  Palafox  J  " 

Dubourdieu,  a  pallid  little  man  with  melancholy  blue  eyes, 
nodded  slightly,  while  Gazonal  bowed  low  to  the  man  of 
genius. 

"  So  you  have  nominated  Stidmann  instead  of " 

"How  could  I  help  it  1  I  was  away,'1  returned  L£on  de 
Lora. 

"You  are  lowering  the  standard  of  the  Academy,"  resumed 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  381 

the  painter.  "  To  think  of  choosing  such  a  man  as  that  I  I 
do  not  wish  to  say  any  harm  of  him,  but  he  is  really  a  crafts- 
man. What  is  to  become  of  the  first  and  most  permanent  of 
all  the  arts,  of  sculpture  that  reveals  the  life  of  a  nation  when 
everything  else,  even  the  memory  of  its  existence,  has  passed 
away — of  sculpture  that  sets  the  seal  of  eternity  upon  the 
great  man  ?  The  sculptor's  office  is  sacred.  He  sums  up  the 
thought  of  his  age,  and  you,  forsooth,  fill  the  ranks  of  the 
priesthood  by  taking  in  a  bungling  mantelpiece  maker,  a  de- 
signer of  drawing-room  ornaments,  one  of  those  that  buy  and 
sell  in  the  Temple  !  Ah  !  as  Chamfort  said,  '  If  you  are  to 
endure  life  in  Paris,  you  must  begin  by  swallowing  a  viper 

every  morning '     After  all,  Art  remains  to  us;  no  one 

can  prevent  us  from  cultivating  Art." 

"And  beside,  my  dear  fellow,  you  have  a  consolation 
which  few  among  artists  possess — the  future  is  yours,"  put  in 
Bixiou.  "When  every  one  is  converted  to  our  doctrine,  you 
will  be  the  foremost  man  in  your  art,  for  the  ideas  which  you 
put  into  your  work  will  be  comprehensible  to  all — when  they 
are  common  property.  In  fifty  years'  time  you  will  be  for  the 
world  at  large  what  you  are  now  for  us — a  great  man.  It  is 
only  a  question  of  holding  out  till  then." 

The  artist's  face  smoothed  itself  out,  after  the  wont  of  mortal 
man  when  flattered  on  his  weak  side.  "  I  have  just  finished 
an  allegorical  figure  of  Harmony,"  he  said.  "  If  you  care  to 
come  to  see  it,  you  will  understand  at  once  how  I  managed 
to  put  two  years'  work  into  it.  It  is  all  there.  At  a  glance 
you  see  the  Destiny  of  the  Globe.  She  is  a  queen  holding  a 
bishop's  crosier,  the  symbol  of  the  aggrandizement  of  races 
useful  to  man  ;  on  her  head  she  wears  the  cap  of  Liberty,  and 
after  the  Egyptian  fashion  (the  ancient  Egyptians  seem  to 
have  had  foreshadowings  of  Fourier)  she  has  six  breasts.  Her 
feet  rest  upon  two  clasped  hands,  which  inclose  the  globe 
between  them,  to  signify  the  brotherhood  of  man  ;  beneath 
her  lie  broken  fragments  of  cannon,  because  all  war  is  abol- 


382  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

ished,  and  I  have  tried  to  give  her  the  serenity  of  Agriculture 
Triumphant.  At  her  feet,  beside,  I  have  put  an  enormous 
Savoy  cabbage,  the  Master's  symbol  of  Concord.  Oh,  it  is 
not  Fourier's  least  claim  to  our  veneration  that  he  revived  the 
association  of  plants  and  ideas  ;  every  detail  in  creation  is 
linked  to  the  rest  by  its  significance  as  a  part  of  a  whole,  and 
no  less  by  its  special  language.  In  a  hundred  years'  time  the 
globe  will  be  much  larger  than  it  is  now " 

"And  how  will  that  come  to  pass?"  inquired  Gazonal, 
amazed  to  hear  a  man  outside  a  lunatic  asylum  talking  in  this 
way. 

"By  the  increase  of  production.  If  people  make  up  their 
minds  to  apply  the  System,  it  should  react  upon  the  stars ;  it 
is  not  impossible " 

"And  in  that  case  what  will  become  of  painting?"  asked 
Gazonal. 

"  Painting  will  be  greater  than  ever." 

"And  will  our  eyes  be  larger?"  continued  Gazonal,  look- 
ing significantly  at  his  friends. 

"  Man  will  be  once  more  as  in  the  days  before  his  degra- 
dation ;  our  six-foot  men  will  be  dwarfs  when  that  time 
comes " 

"How  about  your  picture,"  interrupted  Leon;  "is  it 
finished?" 

"  Quite  finished,"  said  Dubourdieu.  "  I  tried  to  see  Hiclar 
about  a  symphony.  I  should  like  those  who  see  the  picture 
to  hear  music  in  Beethoven's  manner  at  the  same  time ;  the 
music  would  develop  the  ideas,  which  would  thus  reach  the 
intelligence  through  the  avenues  of  sight  and  sound.  Ah  !  if 
the  Government  would  only  lend  me  one  of  the  halls  in  the 
Louvre " 

"But  I  will  mention  it  if  you  like.  Nothing  that  can  strike 
people's  minds  should  be  left  undone." 

"  Oh  !  my  friends  are  preparing  articles,  but  I  am  afraid 
that  they  may  go  too  far." 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  3$3 

"Pshaw  !  "  said  Bixiou,  "they  will  go  nothing  like  as  far 
as  the  Future " 

Dubourdieu  eyed  Bixiou  askance  and  went  on  his  way. 

"  Why,  the  man  is  a  lunatic,"  said  Gazonal,  "  moonstruck 
and  mad." 

"  He  has  technical  skill  and  knowledge,"  said  Leon,  "but 
Fourier  has  been  the  ruin  of  him.  You  have  just  seen  one 
way  in  which  ambition  affects  an  artist.  Too  often  here  in 
Paris,  in  his  desire  to  reach  fame  (which  for  an  artist  means 
fortune)  by  some  short  cut,  he  will  borrow  wings  of  circum- 
stance ;  he  will  think  to  increase  his  stature  by  identifying 
himself  with  some  Cause  or  advocating  some  system,  hoping 
in  time  to  widen  his  coterie  into  a  public.  Such  an  one  sets 
up  to  be  a  Republican,  such  another  a  Saint-Simonian,  an 
aristocrat  or  a  Catholic,  or  he  is  for  the  juste  milieu,  or  the 
Middle  Ages,  or  for  Germany.  But  while  opinions  cannot  give 
talent,  they  inevitably  spoil  it ;  witness  this  unfortunate  being 
whom  you  have  just  seen.  An  artist's  opinion  ought  to  be  a 
faith  in  works ;  and  his  one  way  to  success  is  to  work  while 
Nature  gives  him  the  sacred  fire." 

"Let  us  fly,  Lion  is  moralizing,"  said  Bixiou. 

"And  did  the  man  seriously  mean  what  he  said?"  cried 
Gazonal ;  he  had  not  yet  recovered  from  his  amazement. 

"Very  seriously,"  replied  Bixiou;  "  he  was  quite  as  much 
in  earnest  as  the  king  of  hairdressers  just  now." 

"  He  is  crazy,"  said  Gazonal. 

"He  is  not  the  only  man  driven  crazy  by  Fourier's 
notions,"  returned  Bixiou.  "You  know  nothing  of  Paris. 
Ask  for  a  hundred  thousand  francs  to  carry  out  some  idea 
most  likely  to  be  useful  to  the  species  (to  try  a  steam-engine, 
for  instance),  you  will  die,  like  Salomon  de  Caus,  at  Bicgtre; 
but  when  it  comes  to  a  paradox,  any  one  will  be  cut  in  pieces 
for  it— he  and  his  fortune.  Well,  here  it  is  with  systems  as 
with  practical  matters.  Impossible  newspapers  have  con- 
sumed millions  of  francs  in  the  last  fifteen  years.  The  very 


384  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

fact  that  you  are  in  the  right  of  it  makes  your  lawsuit  so 
difficult  to  win ;  taken  together  with  the  other  fact  that  your 
prefect  has  his  own  private  ends  to  gain,  as  you  say." 

"  Can  you  understand  how  a  clever  man  can  live  anywhere 
but  in  Paris  when  once  he  knows  the  psychology  of  the  city?" 
asked  Leon. 

"  Suppose  that  we  take  Gazonal  to  Mother  Fontaine," 
suggested  Bixiou,  beckoning  a  hackney  cab,  "  it  would  be  a 
transition  from  the  severe  to  the  fantastic.  Drive  to  the  Rue 
Vieille-du-Temple,"  he  called  to  the  man,  and  the  three  drove 
away  in  the  direction  of  the  Marais. 

"  What  are  you  taking  me  to  see  ?  " 

"Ocular  demonstration  of  Bixiou's  remarks,"  said  Leon; 
"  you  are  to  be  shown  a  woman  who  makes  twenty  thousand 
francs  per  annum  by  exploiting  an  idea." 

"A  fortune-teller,"  explained  Bixiou,  construing  Gazonal's 
expression  as  a  question.  "Among  folk  that  wish  to  know 
the  future,  Madame  Fontaine  is  held  to  be  even  wiser  than  the 
late  Mademoiselle  Lenormand." 

"  She  must  be  very  rich  !  " 

"  She  has  fallen  a  victim  to  her  idea  since  lotteries  came 
into  existence.  In  Paris,  you  see,  great  receipts  always  mean 
e  large  expenditure.  Every  hard  head  has  a  crack  in  it  some- 
where, like  a  safety-valve,  as  it  were,  for  the  steam.  Every 
one  that  makes  a  great  deal  of  money  has  his  weaknesses  or 
his  fancies,  a  provision  of  nature  probably  to  keep  the  bal- 
ance." 

"And  now  that  lotteries  are  abolished?" 

"  Oh,  well,  she  has  a  nephew,  and  is  saving  for  him." 

Arrived  in  the  Rue  Vieille-du-Temple,  the  three  friends 
entered  one  of  the  oldest  houses  in  the  street,  and  discovered 
a  tremulous  staircase,  with  wooden  steps  laid  on  a  foundation 
of  concrete.  Up  they  went  in  the  perpetual  twilight,  through 
the  fetid  atmosphere  peculiar  to  houses  with  a  passage  entry, 
till  they  reached  the  third  story,  and  a  door  which  can  only 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  385 

be  described  by  a  drawing ;  any  attempt  to  give  an  adequate 
idea  of  it  in  words  would  consume  too  much  midnight  oil. 

An  old  crone,  so  much  in  keeping  with  the  door  that  she 
might  have  been  its  living  counterpart,  admitted  the  three 
into  a  room  which  did  duty  as  an  antechamber,  icy  cold  as  a 
crypt,  while  the  streets  outside  were  sweltering  in  the  heat. 
Puffs  of  damp  air  came  up  from  an  inner  court,  a  sort  of  huge 
breathing-hole  in  the  building;  a  box  full  of  sickly-looking 
plants  stood  on  the  window-ledge.  A  gray  daylight  filled  the 
room.  Everything  was  glazed  over  with  a  greasy  fuliginous 
deposit ;  the  chairs  and  table,  the  whole  room,  in  fact,  was 
squalid  ;  the  damp  oozed  up  through  the  brick  floor  like  water 
through  the  sides  of  a  Moorish  jar.  There  was  not  a  single 
detail  which  did  not  harmonize  with  the  hook-nosed,  pallid, 
repulsive  old  hag  in  the  much-mended  rags,  who  asked  them 
to  be  seated,  and  informed  them  that  MADAME  never  saw 
more  than  one  person  at  a  time. 

Gazonal  screwed  up  his  courage  and  went  boldly  forward. 

The  woman  whom  he  confronted  looked  like  one  of  those 
whom  Death  has  forgotten,  or  more  probably  left  as  a  copy 
of  himself  in  the  land  of  the  living.  Two  gray  eyes,  so  im- 
movable that  it  tired  you  to  look  at  them,  glittered  in  a  flesh- 
less  countenance  on  either  side  of  a  sunken,  snuff-bedabbled 
nose.  A  set  of  knuckle-bones,  firmly  mounted  with  sinews 
almost  like  bone,  made  as  though  they  were  human  hands, 
thrumming  like  a  piece  of  machinery  thrown  out  of  gear  upon 
a  pack  of  cards.  The  body,  a  broomstick  decently  draped 
with  a  gown,  enjoyed  the  advantages  of  still-life  to  the  full ; 
it  did  not  move  a  hair's-breadth.  A  black  velvet  cap  rose 
above  the  automaton's  forehead.  Mme.  Fontaine,  for  she 
was  really  a  woman,  sat  with  a  black  fowl  on  her  right  hand 
and  a  fat  toad  named  Ashtaroth  on  her  left.  Gazonal  did  not 
notice  the  creature  at  first. 

The  toad,  an  animal  of  portentous  size,  was  less  alarming 
in  himself  than  by  reason  of  a  couple  of  topazes,  each  as  large 
25 


388  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

as  a  fifty-centime  piece,  that  glowed  like  lamps  in  his  head. 
Their  gaze  was  intolerable.  "The  toad  is  a  mysterious 
creature,"  as  the  late  M.  Lassailly  used  to  say,  after  lying 
out  in  the  fields  to  have  the  last  word  with  a  toad  that  fasci- 
nated him.  Perhaps,  all  creation,  man  included,  is  summed 
up  in  the  toad ;  for  Lassailly  tells  us  that  it  lives  on  almost 
indefinitely,  and  it  is  well  known  that,  of  all  animals,  its 
mating  lasts  the  longest. 

The  black  fowl's  cage  stood  two  feet  away  from  a  table 
covered  with  a  green  cloth ;  a  plank  like  a  drawbridge  lay 
between. 

When  the  woman,  the  least  real  of  the  strange  company 
about  a  table  worthy  of  Hoffmann,  bade  Gazonal  "  Cut !  " — 
the  honest  manufacturer  shuddered  in  spite  of  himself.  The 
secret  of  the  formidable  power  of  such  creatures  lies  in  the 
importance  of  the  thing  we  seek  to  learn  of  them.  Men 
and  women  come  to  buy  hope  of  them ;  and  they  know  it. 

The  sibyl's  cave  was  a  good  deal  darker  than  the  ante- 
chamber, so  much  so,  in  fact,  that  you  could  not  distinguish 
the  color  of  the  wall-paper.  The  smoke-begrimed  ceiling,  so 
far  from  reflecting,  seemed  rather  to  absorb  such  feeble  light 
as  struggled  in  through  a  window  blocked  up  with  bleached 
sickly-looking  plant-life;  but  all  the  dim  daylight  in  the 
place  fell  full  upon  the  table  at  which  the  sorceress  sat.  Her 
armchair  and  a  chair  for  Gazonal  completed  the  furniture  of 
a  little  room  cut  in  two  by  a  garret,  where  Mme.  Fontaine 
evidently  slept.  A  little  door  stood  ajar,  and  the  murmur  of 
a  pot  boiling  on  the  fire  reached  Gazonal's  ears.  The  sounds 
from  the  kitchen,  the  compound  of  odors  in  which  effluvia 
from  the  sink  predominated,  called  up  an  incongruous  asso- 
ciation of  ideas — the  necessities  of  every-day  life  and  the  sense 
of  the  supernatural.  Disgust  was  mingled  with  curiosity. 
Gazonal  caught  sight  of  the  lowest  step  of  the  deal  staircase 
which  led  to  the  garret ;  he  saw  all  these  particulars  at  a 
glance,  and  his  gorge  rose.  The  kind  of  terror  inspired  by 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  387 

similar  scenes  in  romances  and  German  plays  was  somehow 
so  different ;  the  absence  of  illusion,  the  prosaic  sensation 
caught  him  by  the  throat.  He  felt  heavy  and  dizzy  in  that 
atmosphere ;  the  gloom  set  his  nerves  on  edge.  With  the 
very  coxcombry  of  courage,  he  turned  his  eyes  on  the  toad, 
and,  with  sickening  sensation  of  heat  in  the  pit  of  the  stomach, 
felt  a  sort  of  panic  such  as  a  criminal  might  feel  at  sight  of  a 
policeman.  Then  he  sought  comfort  in  a  scrutiny  of  Mme. 
Fontaine,  and  found  a  pair  of  colorless,  almost  white  eyes, 
with  intolerable  unwavering  black  pupils.  The  silence  grew 
positively  appalling. 

"What  does  monsieur  wish?"  asked  Mme.  Fontaine. 
"  His  fortune  for  five  francs,  or  ten  francs,  or  the  grand  j nil " 
(great  game). 

"Five  francs  is  quite  dear  enough,"  said  the  Provencal, 
making  unspeakable  efforts  to  fight  against  the  influences  of 
the  place.  But  just  as  he  strove  for  self-possession  a  diaboli- 
cal cackle  made  him  start  on  his  chair.  The  black  hen 
emitted  a  sound. 

"Go  away,  my  girl.  Monsieur  only  wishes  to  spend  five 
francs." 

The  hen  seemed  to  understand,  for  when  she  stood  within 
a  step  of  the  cards  she  turned  and  walked  solemnly  back  to 
her  place. 

"Which  is  your  favorite  flower?"  asked  the  old  crone 
in  a  voice  hoarse  with  the  accumulation  of  phlegm  in  her 
throat. 

"The  rose." 

"  Your  favorite  color?  " 

"Blue." 

"  What  animal  do  you  like  best?" 

"  The  horse.     Why  do  you  ask  ?  "  queried  Gazonal  in  turn. 

"  Man  is  linked  to  other  forms  of  life  by  his  own  previous 
existence,"  she  said  sententiously,  "  hence  his  instincts,  and 
his  instincts  control  his  destiny.  Which  kind  of  food  do  you 


388  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

like  best — fish,  game,  grain,  butcher  meat,  sweet  things,  fruit, 
or  vegetables?" 

"Game." 

"  In  what  month  were  you  born?" 

"September." 

"  Hold  out  your  hand." 

Mme.  Fontaine  scanned  the  palm  put  forth  for  her  inspec- 
tion with  close  attention.  All  this  was  done  in  a  business- 
like way,  with  no  attempt  to  give  a  supernatural  color  to  the 
proceedings ;  a  notary  asking  a  client's  wishes  with  regard  to 
the  drafting  of  a  lease  could  not  have  been  more  straightfor- 
ward. The  cards  being  sufficiently  shuffled,  she  asked  Gazonal 
to  cut  and  make  them  up  into  three  packs.  This  done,  she 
took  up  the  packs,  spread  them  out  one  above  another,  and 
eyed  them  as  a  gambler  eyes  the  thirty-six  numbers  at  roulette 
before  he  stakes  his  money. 

Gazonal  felt  a  cold  chill  freeze  the  marrow  of  his  bones ; 
he  scarcely  knew  where  he  was;  but  his  surprise  grew  more 
and  more  when  this  repulsive  hag  in  the  greasy,  flabby,  green 
skull-cap,  and  false  front  that  exhibited  more  black  silk  than 
hair  curled  into  points  of  interrogation,  began  to  tell  him,  in 
her  rheumy  voice,  of  all  the  events,  even  the  most  intimate 
history  of  his  past  life.  She  told  him  his  tastes,  his  habits, 
his  character,  his  ideas  even  as  a  child;  she  knew  all  that 
might  have  influenced  his  life.  There  was  his  projected  mar- 
riage, for  instance ;  she  told  him  why  and  by  whom  it  was 
broken  off,  giving  him  an  exact  jescription  of  the  woman  he 
had  loved ;  and  finally  she  named  his  district,  and  told  him 
about  his  lawsuit,  and  so  on,  and  so  on. 

Gazonal  thought  at  first  that  the  whole  thing  was  a  hoax 
got  up  for  his  benefit  by  his  cousin ;  but  the  absurdity  of  this 
theory  struck  him  almost  at  once,  and  he  sat  in  gaping  aston- 
ishment. Opposite  sat  the  infernal  power  incarnate,  a  power 
that,  from  among  all  human  shapes,  had  borrowed  that  one 
which  has  struck  the  imagination  of  poets  and  painters  through- 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  389 

out  all  time  as  the  most  appalling — a  cold-blooded,  shrunken, 
asthmatic,  toothless  hag,  with  hard  lips,  flat  nose,  and  pale 
eyes.  Nothing  was  alive  about  Mme.  Fontaine's  face  save 
the  eyes ;  some  gleam  from  the  depths  of  the  future  or  the 
fires  of  hell  sparkled  in  them. 

Gazonal,  scarcely  knowing  what  he  said,  interrupted  her  to 
ask  the  uses  of  the  fowl  and  the  toad. 

< '  To  foretell  the  future.  The  '  consultant '  himself  scatters 
some  seeds  over  the  cards ;  Cleopatra  comes  to  pick  them  up ; 
and  Ashtaroth  creeps  over  them  to  seek  the  food  that  the 
client  gives  him.  Their  wonderful  intelligence  is  never  de- 
ceived. Would  you  like  to  see  them  at  work  and  hear  your 
future  read?  It  costs  a  hundred  francs." 

But  Gazonal,  dismayed  by  Ashtaroth's  expression,  bade  the 
terrible  Mme.  Fontaine  good-day,  and  fled  into  the  next 
room.  He  was  damp  with  perspiration ;  he  seemed  to  feel  an 
unclean  spirit  brooding  over  him. 

"Let  us  go  out  of  this,"  he  said.  "  Has  either  of  you  ever 
consulted  this  witch?" 

'"  I  never  think  of  taking  a  step  in  life  until  Ashtaroth  has 
given  his  opinion,"  said  Leon,  "and  I  am  always  the  better 
for  it." 

"I  am  still  expecting  the  honest  competence  promised  me 
by  Cleopatra,"  added  Bixiou. 

"  I  am  in  a  fever !  "  cried  the  child  of  the  South.  "If  I 
believed  all  that  you  tell  me,  I  should  believe  in  witchcraft, 
in  a  supernatural  power." 

"It  can  only  be  natural,"  put  in  Bixiou.  "Half  the 
artists  alive,  one-third  of  the  lorettes,  and  one-fourth  of  the 
statesmen  consult  Madame  Fontaine.  It  is  well  known  that 
she  acts  as  Egeria*  to  a  certain  statesman." 

"  Did  she  tell  you  your  fortune?  "  inquired  L£on. 
"No.     I  had  quite  enough  of  it  with  the  past."     A  sudden 
idea  struck  Gazonal.     "  But  if  she  and  her  disgusting  collab- 
*  The  nymph  who  gave  the  laws  to  the  Romans. 


390  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

orators  can  foretell  the  future,"  he  said,  "  how  is  it  that  she 
is  unlucky  in  the  lottery?" 

"  Ah  1  there  you  have  set  your  finger  on  one  of  the  great 
mysteries  of  occult  science,"  answered  Leon.  "So  soon  as 
the  personal  element  dims  the  surface  of  that  inward  mirror, 
as  it  were,  which  reflects  past  and  future,  so  soon  as  you 
introduce  any  motive  foreign  to  the  exercise  of  this  power 
that  they  possess,  the  sorcerer  or  sorceress  at  once  loses  the' 
power  of  vision.  It  is  the  same  with  the  artist  who  systemati- 
cally prostitutes  art  to  gain  advancement  or  alien  ends ;  he 
loses  his  gift.  Madame  Fontaine  once  had  a  rival,  a  man 
who  told  fortunes  on  the  cards ;  he  fell  into  criminal  courses, 
yet  he  never  foresaw  his  own  arrest,  conviction,  and  sentence. 
Madame  Fontaine  is  right  eight  times  out  of  ten,  yet  she 
never  could  tell  that  she  should  lose  her  stake  in  the  lottery." 

"  It  is  the  same  with  magnetism,"  Bixiou  remarked.  "A 
man  cannot  magnetize  himself." 

"  Good  !  Now  comes  magnetism.  What  next !  Do  you 
really  know  everything?" 

"  My  friend  Gazonal,  before  you  can  laugh  at  everything, 
you  must  know  everything,"  said  Bixiou  with  gravity.  "  For 
my  own  part,  I  have  known  Paris  since  I  was  a  boy,  and  my 
pencil  helps  me  to  laugh  for  a  livelihood  at  the  rate  of  five 
caricatures  per  month.  So  I  very  often  laugh  at  an  idea  in 
which  I  have  faith." 

"  Now,  let  us  go  in  for  something  else,"  said  Leon.  "  Let 
us  drive  to  the  Chamber  and  arrange  the  cousin's  business." 

"This,"  continued  Bixiou,  burlesquing  Odry  and  Gaillard, 
"is  High  Comedy;  we  will  draw  out  the  first  great  speaker 
that  we  meet  in  the  Salle  des  Pas  Perdus ;  and  there,  as  every- 
where else,  you  shall  hear  the  Parisian  harping  upon  two 
eternal  strings — Self-interest  and  Vanity." 

As  they  stepped  into  the  cab  again,  Le"on  noticed  a  man 
driving  rapidly  past,  and  signaled  his  wish  to  speak  a  word 
with  the  new-comer. 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  391 

"  It  is  Publicola  Masson,"  he  told  Bixiou  ;  "  I  will  just  ask 
him  for  an  interview  this  evening  at  five  o'clock  when  the 
House  rises.  The  cousin  shall  see  the  queerest  of  all  charac- 
ters." 

"Who  is  it?"  asked  Gazonal,  while  Leon  went  across  to 
speak  to  his  man. 

"A  chiropodist,  that  will  cut  your  corns  by  contract,  an 
author  of  a  treatise  on  chiropody.  If  the  Republicans  triumph 
for  six  months,  he  will  without  doubt  have  a  place  in  history." 

"  And  does  he  keep  a  carriage  ?  " 

"  No  one  but  a  millionaire  can  afford  to  go  about  on  foot 
here,  my  friend." 

"  The  Chamber  1 "  L6on  called  to  the  driver. 

"Which,  sir?" 

"The  Chamber  of  Deputies,"  said  L6on,  exchanging  a 
smile  with  Bixiou. 

"  Paris  is  beginning  to  confuse  me,"  sighed  Gazonal. 

"  To  show  you  its  immensity — moral,  political,  and  literary 
— we  are  copying  the  Roman  cicerone  that  shows  you  a  thumb 
of  the  statue  of  St.  Peter,  which  you  take  for  a  life-size  figure 
until  you  find  out  that  a  finger  is  more  than  a  foot  long. 
You  have  not  so  much  as  measured  one  of  the  toes  of  Paris 
yet " 

"And  observe,  Cousin  Gazonal,  that  we  are  taking  things 
as  they  come,  we  are  not  selecting." 

"You  shall  have  a  Belshazzar's  feast  to-night;  you  shall 
see  Paris,  our  Paris,  playing  at  lansquenet,  staking  a  hundred 
thousand  francs  without  winking  an  eye." 

Fifteen  minutes  later  their  hack  set  them  down  by  the  flight 
of  steps  before  the  Chamber  of  Deputies  on  that  side  of  the 
Pont  de  la  Concorde  which  leads  to  discord. 

"I  thought  the  Chambers  were  unapproachable,"  said 
Gazonal,  surprised  to  find  himself  in  the  great  Salle  des  Pas 
Perdus. 

"That  depends,"  said  Bixiou.     " Physically  speaking,  it 


392  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

costs  you  thirty  sous  in  cab-hire ;  politically  speaking,  rather 
more.  A  poet  says  that  the  swallows  think  that  the  Arc  de 
Triomphe  de  1'Etoile  was  built  for  them ;  and  we  artists  be- 
lieve that  this  public  monument  was  built  to  console  the 
failures  on  the  stage  of  the  Theatre-Fran cais  and  to  amuse 
us ;  but  these  state-paid  play-actors  are  more  expensive  than 
the  others,  and  it  is  not  every  day  that  we  get  our  money's 
worth." 

"  So  this  is  the  Chamber  !  "  repeated  Gazonal.  He  strode 
through  the  great  hall,  almost  empty  now,  looking  about  him 
with  an  expression  which  Bixiou  noted  down  in  his  memory 
for  one  of  the  famous  caricatures  in  which  he  rivals  Gavarni. 
Leon  on  his  side  walked  up  to  one  of  the  ushers  who  come 
and  go  constantly  between  the  Salle  des  Seances  itself  and 
the  lobby,  where  the  reporters  of  the  "  Moniteur "  are  at 
work  while  the  House  is  sitting,  with  some  persons  attached 
to  the  Chamber. 

"The  Minister  is  here,"  the  usher  was  telling  Leon  as 
Gazonal  came  up,  "  but  I  do  not  know  whether  Monsieur 

Giraud  has  gone  or  not ;  I  will  see "  He  opened  one  of 

the  folding  doors  through  which  no  one  is  allowed  to  pass 
save  deputies,  ministers,  or  royal  commissioners,  when  a  man 
came  out,  young  as  yet,  as  it  seemed  to  Gazonal,  in  spite  of 
his  forty-eight  years.  To  this  new-comer  the  usher  pointed 
out  Leon  de  Lora. 

"  Aha !  you  here  !  "  he  said,  shaking  hands  with  Leon  and 
Bixiou.  "You  rascals!  what  do  you  want  in  the  innermost 
sanctuary  of  law  ?  " 

"  Gad  !  we  have  come  for  a  lesson  in  the  art  of  humbug," 
said  Bixiou.  "  One  gets  rusty  if  one  does  not." 

"  Then  let  us  go  out  into  the  garden,"  said  the  new-comer, 
not  knowing  that  Gazonal  was  one  of  the  company. 

Gazonal  was  at  a  loss  how  to  classify  the  well-dressed 
stranger  in  plain  black  from  head  to  foot,  with  a  ribbon  and 
an  order ;  but  he  followed  to  the  terrace  by  the  river  once 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  393 

known  as  the  Quai  Napoleon.  Out  in  the  garden  the  ci- 
devant  (erstwhile)  young  man  gave  vent  to  a  laugh,  suppressed 
since  his  appearance  in  the  Salle  des  Pas  Perdus. 

"  Why,  what  is  the  matter  with  you  ?  "  asked  L6on  de  Lora 
of  the  new-comer. 

"  My  dear  friend,  we  are  driven  to  tell  terrific  lies  with 
incredible  coolness  to  prove  the  sincerity  of  the  constitutional 
government.  Now  I  myself  have  my  moods.  There  are  days 
when  I  can  lie  like  a  political  programme,  and  others  when  I 
cannot  keep  my  countenance.  This  is  one  of  my  hilarious 
days.  Now  the  Opposition  has  called  upon  the  chief  secretary 
to  disclose  secrets  of  diplomacy  which  he  would  not  impart  if 
they  were  in  office,  and  at  this  moment  he  is  on  his  legs  pre- 
paring to  go  through  a  gymnastic  performance.  And  as  he  is 
an  honest  man  that  will  not  lie  on  his  own  account,  he  said 
confidentially  to  me  before  he  mounted  to  the  breach,  '  I  have 
not  a  notion  what  to  tell  them.'  So,  when  I  saw  him  there, 
an  uncontrollable  desire  to  laugh  seized  me,  and  I  went  out, 
for  you  cannot  very  well  have  your  laugh  out  on  the  Minis- 
terial benches,  where  my  youth  occasionally  revisits  me  un- 
seasonably." 

"At  last!"  cried  Gazonal.  "At  last!  I  have  found  an 
honest  man  in  Paris.  You  must  be  indeed  great !  "  he  con- 
tinued, looking  at  the  stranger. 

"  I  say,  who  is  this  gentleman  ?  "  inquired  the  other,  scrut- 
inizing Gazonal  as  he  spoke. 

"  A  cousin  of  mine,"  L6on  put  in  hastily.  "  I  can  answer 
for  his  silence  and  loyalty  as  for  my  own.  We  have  come 
here  on  his  account ;  he  has  a  lawsuit  on  hand,  it  depends  on 
your  department ;  his  prefect  simply  wishes  to  ruin  him,  and 
we  have  come  to  see  you  about  it  and  to  prevent  the  Council 
of  State  from  confirming  injustice." 

"  Who  is  the  chairman  ?  " 

"Massol." 

"Good." 


394  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS 

"And  our  friends  Claud  Vignon  and  Giraud  are  on  the 
committee,"  added  Bixiou. 

"Just  say  a  word  to  them,  and  let  them  come  to  Carabine's 
to-night,"  said  Leon.  "  Du  Tillet  is  giving  a  party,  ostensi- 
bly a  meeting  of  railway  shareholders,  for  they  rob  you  more 
than  ever  on  the  highways  now." 

"  But,  I  say,  is  this  in  the  Pyrenees?  "  inquired  the  young- 
looking  stranger,  grown  serious  by  this  time. 

"Yes,"  said  Gazonal. 

"And  you  do  not  vote  for  us  at  the  general  election,"  he 
continued,  fixing  his  eyes  on  Gazonal. 

"No;  but  the  remarks  you  made  just  now  have  corrupted 
me.  On  the  honor  of  a  Commandant  of  the  National  Guard, 
I  will  see  that  your  candidate  is  returned " 

"Very  well.  Can  you  further  guarantee  your  cousin?" 
asked  the  young-looking  man,  addressing  L6on. 

"We  are  forming  him,"  said  Bixiou,  in  a  very  comical 
tone. 

"  Well,  I  shall  see,"  said  the  other,  and  he  hurried  back  to 
the  Salle  des  Seances. 

"  I  say,  who  is  that?" 

"  The  Comte  de  Rastignac  ;  he  is  the  head  of  the  depart- 
ment in  which  your  affair  is  going  on." 

"A  Minister!     Is  that  all  ?" 

"  He  is  an  old  friend  of  ours  as  well,  and  he  has  three  hun- 
dred thousand  livres  a  year,  and  he  is  a  peer  of  France,  and 
the  King  has  given  him  the  title  of  count.  He  is  Nucingen's 
son-in-law,  and  one  of  the  two  or  three  statesmen  produced 
by  the  Revolution  of  July.  Now  and  then,  however,  he  finds 
office  dull,  and  comes  out  to  have  a  laugh  with  us." 

"  But,  look  here,  cousin,  you  did  not  tell  us  that  you  were 
on  the  other  side  down  yonder,"  said  Leon,  taking  Gazonal 
by  the  arm.  "  How  stupid  you  are  !  One  deputy  more  or 
less  to  the  Right  or  Left,  will  you  sleep  any  the  softer  for 
that?" 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  395 

"  We  are  on  the  side  of  the  others " 


"Let  them  be,"  said  Bixiou — Monrose  himself  could  not 
have  spoken  the  words  more  comically — "  let  them  be,  they 
have  Providence  on  their  side,  and  Providence  will  look  after 
them  without  your  assistance  and  in  spite  of  themselves.  A 
manufacturer  is  bound  to  be  a  necessarian." 

'•'Good!  here  comes  Maxime  with  Canalis  and  Giraud," 
cried  Leon. 

"  Come,  friend  Gazonal ;  the  promised  actors  are  arriving 
on  the  scene." 

The  three  went  toward  the  new-comers,  who  to  all  appear- 
ance were  lounging  on  the  terrace. 

"  Have  they  sent  you  about  your  business  that  you  are  do- 
ing like  this?"  inquired  Bixiou,  addressing  Giraud. 

"  No.  We  have  come  out  for  a  breath  of  air  till  the  ballot 
is  over." 

"  And  how  did  the  chief  secretary  get  out  of  it  ?  " 
"  He  was  magnificent  !  "  said  Canalis. 
"  Magnificent !  "  from  Giraud. 
"  Magnificent  !  "  from  Maxime. 
"  I  say  !  Right,  Left,  and  Centre  all  of  one  mind  !  " 
"  Each  of  us  has  a  different  idea  in  his  head  though," 
Maxime  de  Trailles  remarked.     (Maxime  was  a  Ministerialist.) 
"  Yes,"  laughed  Canalis.     Canalis  had  once  been  in  office, 
but  he  was  now  edging  away  toward  the  Right.  . 

"You  have  just  enjoyed  a  great  triumph,"  Maxime  said, 
addressing  Canalis,  »  for  you  drove  the  Minister 

"Yes,  and  to  lie  like  a  charlatan,"  returned  Canalis. 
"  A  glorious  victory  !  "  commented  honest  Giraud. 
would  you  have  done  in  his  place?" 
"  I  should  have  lied  likewise." 

"Nobody  calls  it   'lying,'"  said  Maxime;  "it  is  cal 
'covering  the  Crown,'"  and  he  drew  Canalis  a  few  pac 

aside. 

Leon  turned  to  Giraud. 


396  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"  Canalis  is  a  very  good  speaker,"  he  said. 

"Yes  and  no,"  returned  the  State  councilor.  "He  is  an 
empty  drum,  an  artist  in  words  rather  than  a  speaker.  In 
short,  'tis  a  fine  instrument,  but  it  is  not  music,  and  therefore 
he  has  not  had  and  never  will  have  '  the  ear  of  the  House.' 
He  thinks  that  France  cannot  do  without  him ;  but  whatever 
happens,  he  cannot,  really  cannot,  possibly  be  '  the  man  of 
the  situation.' ' 

Canalis  and  Maxima  rejoined  the  group  just  as  Giraud, 
deputy  of  the  Centre-Left,  delivered  himself  of  this  verdict. 
Maxime  took  Giraud  by  the  arm  and  drew  him  away,  proba- 
bly to  give  the  same  confidences  that  Canalis  had  received. 

"What  an  honest,  worthy  fellow  he  is !  "  said  Leon,  indi- 
cating Giraud. 

"  That  kind  of  honesty  is  the  ruin  of  a  government,"  re- 
plied Canalis. 

"Is  he  a  good  speaker,  in  your  opinion?" 

"Yes  and  no,"  said  Canalis.  "He  is  wordy  and  prosy. 
He  is  a  plodding  reasoner,  a  good  logician  ;  but  he  does  not 
comprehend  the  wider  logic — the  logic  of  events  and  of  affairs 
— for  which  reason  he  has  not  and  never  will  have  '  the  ear 
of  the  House' " 

Canalis  was  in  the  midst  of  his  summing-up  when  the  sub- 
ject of  his  remarks  came  toward  them  with  Maxime;  and, 
forgetting  that  there  was  a  stranger  present  whose  discretion 
was  not  so  certain  as  Leon's  or  Bixiou's,  he  took  Canalis' 
hand  significantly. 

"Very  good,"  said  he,  "I  agree  to  Monsieur  le  Comte  de 
Tiailles'  proposals.  I  will  ask  the  question,  but  it  will  be 
pressed  hard." 

"  Then  we  shall  have  the  House  with  us  on  the  question, 
for  a  man  of  your  capacity  and  eloquence  always  has  '  the  ear 
of  the  House,'"  returned  Canalis.  "I  will  undertake  to 
crush  you  and  no  mistake." 

"  You  very  likely  will  bring  about  a  change  of  ministry,  for 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  397 

on  such  grounds  you  can  do  anything  you  like  with  the 
House,  and  you  will  be  '  the  man  of  the  situation  ' " 

"  Maxime  has  hocussed  them  both,"  said  Leon,  turning  to 
his  cousin.  "  That  fine  fellow  is  as  much  at  home  in  parlia- 
mentary intrigue  as  a  fish  in  water." 

"Who  is  he?"  asked  Gazonal. 

"  He  was  a  scamp ;  he  is  in  a  fair  way  to  be  an  ambas- 
sador," answered  Bixiou. 

"Giraud,"  said  Leon,  "do  not  go  until  you  have  asked 
Rastignac  to  say  something,  as  he  promised  me  he  would, 
about  a  lawsuit  that  will  come  up  for  decision  before  you  the 
day  after  to-morrow  ;  it  affects  my  cousin  here.  I  will  come 
round  to-morrow  morning  to  see  you  about  it."  And  the 
three  friends  followed  the  three  politicians,  at  a  certain  dis- 
tance, to  the  Salle  des  Pas  Perdus. 

"  Now,  cousin,  look  at  the  two  yonder,"  said  L£on,  point- 
ing out  a  retired  and  very  famous  Minister  and  the  leader  of 
the  Left  Centre,  "those  are  two  speakers  that  always  have 
the  '  ear  of  the  House ; '  they  have  been  called  in  joke  the 
leaders  of  his  majesty's  Opposition  ;  they  have  the  ear  of  the 
House,  so  much  so  indeed  that  they  very  often  pull  it." 

"It  is  four  o'clock.  Let  us  go  back  to  the  Rue  de  Berlin," 
said  Bixiou. 

"  Yes.  You  have  just  seen  the  heart  of  the  Government; 
now  you  ought  to  see  the  parasites  and  ascarides,  the  tapeworm, 
or,  since  one  must  call  him  by  his  given  name — the  Repub- 
lican." 

The  friends  were  no  sooner  packed  into  their  cab  than 
Gazonal  looked  maliciously  at  his  cousin  and  Bixiou ;  there 
was  a  pent-up  flood  of  southern  and  splenetic  oratory  within 
him. 

"I  had  my  suspicions  before  of  this  great  jade  of  a  city," 
he  burst  out  in  his  thick  southern  accent,  "but  after  this  morn- 
ing I  despise  it.  The  poor  country  district,  for  so  shabby  as 
she  is,  is  an  honest  girl ;  but  Paris  is  a  prostitute,  rapacious, 


398  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

deceitful,  artificial,  and  I  am  very  glad  to  escape  with  my 
skin " 

"The  day  is  not  over  yet,"  Bixiou  said  sententiously,  with 
a  wink  at  Leon. 

"And  why  complain  like  a  fool  of  a  so-called  prostitution 
by  which  you  will  gain  your  case  ?  "  added  Leon.  "  Do  you 
think  yourself  a  better  man,  less  hypocritical  than  we  are,  less 
rapacious,  less  ready  to  make  a  descent  of  any  sort,  less  taken 
up  with  vanity  than  all  those  whom  we  have  set  dancing  like 
marionettes?  " 

"Try  to  tempt  me." 

"  Poor  fellow  !  "  shrugged  Leon.  "  Have  you  not  promised 
your  vote  and  influence,  as  it  is,  to  Rastignac  ?  " 

"  Yes ;  because  he  is  the  only  one  among  them  that  laughed 
at  himself." 

"Poor  fellow!"  echoed  Bixiou.  "And  you  distrust  me 
when  I  have  done  nothing  but  laugh  !  You  remind  me  of  a 
cur  snapping  at  a  tiger.  Ah,  if  you  had  but  seen  us  making 
game  of  somebody  or  other.  Do  you  realize  that  we  are  ca- 
pable of  driving  a  sane  man  out  of  his  wits?  " 

At  this  point  they  reached  Leon's  house.  The  splendor  of 
its  furniture  cut  Gazonal  short  and  put  an  end  to  the  dispute. 
Rather  later  in  the  day  it  began  to  dawn  upon  him  that  Bixiou 
had  been  drawing  him  out. 

At  half-past  five,  Leon  de  Lora  was  dressing  for  the  evening, 
to  Gazonal's  great  bewilderment.  He  counted  up  his  cousin's 
thousand-and-one  superfluities,  and  admired  the  valet's  serious- 
ness, when  "monsieur's  chiropodist"  was  announced,  and 
Publicola  Masson  entered  the  room,  bowed  to  Gazonal  and 
Bixiou,  set  down  a  little  case  of  instruments,  and  took  a  low- 
chair  opposite  Leon.  The  new-comer,  a  little  man  of  fifty, 
bore  a  certain  resemblance  to  Marat. 

"  How  are  things  going?"  inquired  Leon,  holding  out  a 
foot,  previously  washed  by  the  servant. 

"  Well,  I  am  compelled  to  take  a  couple  of  pupils,  two 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  890 

young  fellows  that  have  given  up  surgery  in  despair  and  taken 
to  chiropody.  They  were  starving,  and  yet  they  are  not 
without  brains " 

"  Oh,  I  was  not  speaking  of  matters  pedestrian ;  I  was  ask- 
ing after  your  political  programme " 

Masson's  glance  at  Gazonal  was  more  expressive  than  any 
spoken  inquiry. 

"  Oh  !  speak  out ;  that  is  my  cousin,  and  he  is  all  but  one 
of  you  ;  he  fancies  that  he  is  a  Legitimist." 

"  Oh,  well,  we  are  getting  on ;  we  are  getting  on.  All 
Europe  will  be  with  us  in  five  years'  time.  Switzerland  and 
Italy  are  in  full  ferment,  and  we  are  ready  for  the  opportunity 
if  it  comes.  Here,  for  instance,  we  have  fifty  thousand 
armed  men,  to  say  nothing  of  two  hundred  thousand  penniless 
citizens " 

"  Pooh  !  '*  said  Leon,  "  how  about  the  fortifications?" 

" Pie-crusts  made  to  be  broken,"  Masson  retorted.  "In 
the  first  place,  we  shall  never  allow  artillery  to  come  within 
range  ;  and,  in  the  second,  we  have  a  little  contrivance  more 
effectual  than  all  the  fortifications  in  the  world,  an  invention 
which  we  owe  to  the  doctor  who  cured  folk  faster  than  all  the 
rest  of  the  faculty  could  kill  them  while  his  machine  was  in 
operation." 

"What  a  rate  you  are  going!"  said  Gazonal.  The  sight 
of  Publicola  made  his  flesh  creep. 

"  Oh,  there  is  no  help  for  it.  We  come  after  Robespierre 
and  Saint-Just,  to  improve  upon  them.  They  were  timid,  and 
you  see  what  came  of  it — an  emperor,  the  elder  branch  and 
then  the  younger.  The  Mountain  did  not  prune  the  social 
tree  sufficiently.*' 

"  Look  here,  you  that  will  be  consul,  or  tribune,  or  some- 
thing like  it,  don't  forget  that  I  have  asked  for  your  protec- 
tion any  time  these  ten  years,"  said  Bixiou. 

"  Nothing  will  happen  to  vou.  We  shall  need  jesters,  and 
you  could  take  up  Barere's  job." 


400  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

"And  I?"  queried  L<§on. 

"Oh,  you  are  my  client;  that  will  save  you;  for  genius 
is  an  odious  privileged  class  that  receives  far  too  much  here 
in  France.  We  shall  be  forced  to  demolish  a  few  of  our  great 
men  to  teach  the  rest  the  lesson  that  they  must  be  simple 
citizens." 

This  was  said  with  a  mixture  of  jest  and  earnest  that  sent  a 
shudder  through  Gazonal. 

"Then  will  there  be  an  end  of  religion?"  he  asked. 

"An  end  of  a  State  religion"  said  Masson,  laying  a  stress 
on  the  two  last  words;  "every  one  will  have  his  own  belief. 
It  is  a  very  lucky  thing  that  the  Government  just  now  is  pro- 
tecting the  convents ;  they  are  accumulating  the  wealth  for 
our  Government.  Everybody  is  conspiring  to  help  us.  For 
instance,  all  those  who  pity  the  people,  and  bawl  so  much 
over  the  proletariat  and  the  wage-earning  classes,  or  write 
against  the  Jesuits,  or  interest  themselves  in  the  amelioration 
of  anybody  whatsoever — communists,  humanitarians,  philan- 
thropists, you  understand — all  these  folk  are  our  advanced 
guard.  While  we  lay  in  powder  they  are  braiding  the  fuse, 
and  the  spark  of  circumstance  will  set  fire  to  it." 

"Now,  pray,  what  do  you  want  for  the  welfare  of  the 
country?" 

"Equality  among  the  citizens,  cheap  commodities  of  every 
kind.  There  shall  be  no  starving  folk  on  one  hand,  no 
millionaires  on  the  other;  no  blood-suckers,  no  victims — 
that  is  what  we  want." 

"Which  is  to  say  the  maximum  and  the  minimum?" 
queried  Gazonal. 

"You  have  spoken,"  the  other  returned  laconically. 

"  An  end  of  manufacturers?  " 

"Manufactures  will  be  carried  on  for  the  benefit  of  the 
State ;  we  shall  all  have  a  life-interest  in  France.  Every 
man  will  have  his  rations  served  out  as  if  he  were  on  board 
ship,  and  everybody  will  do  the  work  for  which  he  is  fitted." 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  401 

"  Good.  And  meanwhile,  until  you  can  cut  your  aristocrats' 
heads  off " 

"I  pare  their  nails,"  said  the  Republican-Radical,  shutting 
up  his  case  of  instruments  and  finishing  the  joke  himself. 
Then  with  a  very  polite  bow  he  withdrew. 

"  Is  it  possible  ?    In  1845  ?"  cried  Gazonal. 

"If  we  had  time  we  could  show  you  all  the  characters  of 
1793;  and  you  should  talk  with  them.  You  have  just  seen 
Marat.  Well,  we  know  Fouquier-Tinville,  Collot-d'Herbois, 
Robespierre,  Chabot,  Fouche,  Barras,  and  even  a  magnificent 
Madame  Roland." 

"Ah,  well,  tragedy  has  not  been  left  unrepresented  on  thij 
stage,"  said  Gazonal. 

"  It  is  six  o'clock.  We  will  take  you  to  see  Odry  in  'Les 
Saltimbanques '  this  evening,  but  first  we  must  call  upon 
Madame  Cadine,  an  actress,  very  intimate  with  Massol  your 
chairman ;  you  must  pay  your  court  assiduously  to  her  to- 
night." 

"As  it  is  absolutely  necessary  that  you  should  conciliate 
this  power,  I  will  just  give  you  a  few  hints,"  added  Bixiou. 

"  Do  you  employ  women  in  your  factory  ?  " 

"Assuredly." 

"  That  was  all  that  I  wanted  to  know,"  said  Bixiou.  "  You 
are  not  a  married  man,  you  are  a  great " 

"  Yes,"  interrupted  Gazonal.  "  You  have  guessed ;  women 
are  my  weak  point." 

"  Very  good.  If  you  decide  to  execute  a  little  manauvre 
which  I  will  teach  you,  you  shair  know  something  of  the 
charm  of  intimacy  with  an  actress  without  spending  one  cen- 
time." 

Bixiou,   intent  on  playing  a  mischievous  trick  upon  t 
cautious  Gazonal,  had  scarcely  finished  tracing  out  his  part 
for  him,  when  they  reached  Mme.  Cadine's  house  in  the  Rue 
de  la  Victoire.     But  a  hint  was  enough   for  the  southern 
brain,  as  will  shortly  be  seen. 
26 


402  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

They  climbed  the  stair  of  a  tolerably  fine  house,  and  dis- 
covered Jennie  Cadine  finishing  her  dinner.  She  was  to  play 
in  the  second  piece  at  the  Gyranase.  Gazonal  introduced  to 
the  power,  Leon  and  Bixiou  went  aside  ostensibly  to  see  a 
new  piece  of  furniture,  really  to  leave  the  two  alone  together; 
but  not  before  Bixiou  had  whispered  to  her  that  "  this  was 
Leon's  cousin,  a  manufacturer  worth  millions  of  francs.  He 
wants  to  gain  his  lawsuit  against  the  prefect  in  the  Council  of 
State,"  he  added,  "so  he  wishes  to  win  you  first,  to  have 
Massol  on  his  side." 

All  Paris  knows  Jennie  Cadine's  great  beauty ;  no  one  can 
wonder,  therefore,  that  Gazonal  stood  dumfounded  at  sight  of 
her.  She  had  received  him  almost  coldly  at  first,  but  during 
those  few  minutes  that  he  spent  alone  with  her  she  was  very 
gracious  to  him.  Gazonal  looked  contemptuously  round  at 
the  drawing-room  furniture  through  the  door  left  ajar  by  his 
fellow-conspirators,  and  made  a  mental  estimate  of  the  con- 
tents of  the  dining-room. 

"  How  any  man  can  leave  such  a  woman  as  you  in  such  a 
dog-hole  as  this  ! "  he  began. 

"  Ah !  there  it  is.  It  cannot  be  helped.  Massol  is  not 
rich.  I  am  waiting  until  he  is  a  Minister " 

"  Happy  man  !  "  exclaimed  Gazonal,  heaving  a  sigh  from 
the  depths  of  a  provincial  heart. 

"Good,"  thought  the  actress,  "I  shall  have  new  furniture; 
I  can  rival  Carabine  now." 

Leon  came  in.  "Well,  dear  child,"  he  said,  "you  are 
coming  to  Carabine's  this  evening,  are  you  not  ?  Supper  and 
lansquenet." 

"Will  monsieur  be  there?"  Jenny  asked  artlessly  and 
sweetly. 

"  Yes,  madame,"  said  Gazonal,  dazzled  by  his  rapid  success. 

"But  Massol  will  be  there  too,"  rejoined  Bixiou. 

"Well,  and  what  has  that  to  do  with  it?"  retorted  Jenny. 
"  Now  let  us  go,  my  treasures,  I  must  be  off  to  my  theatre." 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  403 

Gazonal  handed  her  down  to  the  cab  that  was  waiting  for 
her  at  the  door,  and  squeezed  her  hands  so  tenderly  that 
Jenny  wrung  her  fingers. 

"  Eh  !  "  she  cried,  "  I  have  not  a  second  set." 

Once  in  the  carriage,  Gazonal  tried  to  hug  Bixiou.  "  She 
is  hooked  !  "  he  cried;  "  you  are  a  most  unmitigated  scoun- 
drel !  " 

"  So  the  women  say,"  returned  Bixiou. 

At  half-past  eleven,  after  the  play,  a  hack  brought  the  trio 
to  Mile.  Seraphine  Sinet's  abode.  Every  well-known  lorette 
either  takes  a  pseudonym,  or  somebody  bestows  one  upon  her, 
and  Seraphine  is  better  known  as  Carabine,  possibly  because 
she  never  fails  to  bring  down  her  "pigeon."  She  had  come 
to  be  almost  indispensable  to  du  Tillet  the  famous  banker, 
and  member  of  the  Left  Centre,  and  at  that  time  she  was  liv- 
ing in  charming  rooms  in  the  Rue  Saint-Georges.  There  are 
certain  houses  in  Paris  that  seem  fated  to  carry  on  a  tradition ; 
this  particular  house  had  already  seen  seven  reigns  of  cour- 
tesans. A  stockbroker  had  installed  Suzanne  de  Val-Noble 
in  it  somewhere  about  the  year  1827.  The  notorious  Esther 
had  here  driven  the  Baron  de  Nucingen  *  to  commit  the  only 
follies  of  his  life.  Here  Florine,  and  she  whom  some  face- 
tiously call  the  "late  Madame  Schontz,"  had  shone  in  turn, 
and  finally  when  du  Tillet  tired  of  his  wife  he  had  taken  the 
little  modern  house  and  established  Carabine  in  it ;  her  lively 
wit,  her  off-hand  manners,  her  brilliant  shamelessness  provided 
him  with  a  counterpoise  for  the  cares  of  life,  domestic,  public, 
and  financial. 

Ten  covers  were  always  laid;  dinner  was  served  (and 
splendidly)  whether  du  Tillet  and  Carabine  were  at  home 
or  not.  Artists,  men  of  letters,  journalists,  and  frequenters 
of  the  house  dined  there,  and  there  was  play  of  an  evening. 
More  than  one  member  of  the  Chamber  came  hither  to  seek 
the  pleasure  that  is  paid  for  in  Paris  by  its  weight  in  gold.  A 
*  See  "  The  Harlot's  Progress." 


404  THE   UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

few  feminine  eccentrics,  certain  falling  stars  of  doubtful  signif- 
icance that  sparkle  in  the  Parisian  firmanent,  appeared  here 
in  all  the  splendor  of  their  toilettes.  The  conversation  was 
good,  for  talk  was  unrestrained,  and  anything  might  be  said 
and  was  said.  Carabine,  a  rival  of  the  no  less  celebrated 
Malaga,  had  fallen  heir  as  it  were  to  several  salons ;  the 
coteries  belonging  to  Florine  (now  Mme.  Nathan),  Tullia 
(afterward  Comtesse  du  Bruel),  and  Madame  Schontz*  (who 
became  the  wife  of  President  du  Ronceret)  had  all  rallied  to 
Carabine. 

Gazonal  made  but  one  remark  as  he  came  in,  but  his  obser- 
vation was  both  legitimate  and  Legitimist — "It  is  finer  than 
the  Tuileries,"  said  he;  and,  indeed,  his  provincial  eyes 
found  so  much  employment  with  satins,  velvets,  brocades,  and 
gilding  that  he  did  not  see  Jenny  Cadine  in  a  dress  that  com- 
manded respect,  hidden  behind  Carabine.  She  was  taking 
mental  notes  of  her  litigant's  entry  while  she  chatted  with  her 
hostess. 

"This  is  my  cousin,  my  dear,"  said  Leon,  addressing 
Carabine;  "  he  is  a  manufacturer;  he  dropped  in  upon  me 
this  morning  from  the  Pyrenees.  He  knows  nothing  as  yet 
of  Paris ;  he  wants  Massol's  help  in  a  case  that  has  gone  up 
to  the  Council  of  State ;  so  we  have  taken  the  liberty  of  bring- 
ing him  here  to  supper,  beseeching  you  at  the  same  time  to 
leave  him  in  full  possession  of  his  faculties " 

"As  he  pleases ;  wine  is  dear,"  said  Carabine,  scanning  the 
provincial,  who  struck  her  as  in  no  wise  remarkable. 

As  for  Gazonal,  dazzled  by  the  women's  dresses,  the  lights, 
the  gilding,  and  the  chatter  of  various  groups,  all  concerned, 
as  he  supposed,  with  him  and  his  affairs,  he  could  only  stam- 
mer out  incoherent  words. 

"  Madame — madame — you  are — you  are  very  kind." 

"What  do  you  manufacture?"  asked  the  mistress  of  the 
house,  smiling  at  him. 

*  See  "  Beatrix." 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS.  405 

"Say  lace,"  prompted  Bixiou  in  a  whisper,  "and  offer  her 
pillow- lace  or  guipures." 

"P-p-pill " 

"  Pills !  "  said  Carabine.  "  I  say,  Cadine,  child,  you  have 
been  taken  in." 

"Lace,"  Gazonal  got  out,  comprehending  that  he  must 
pay  for  his  supper.  "  It  will  give  me  the  greatest  pleasure  to 
offer  you — er — a  dress — a  scarf — a  mantilla  of  my  own  manu- 
facture." 

"  What,  three  things  !  Well,  well,  you  are  nicer  than  you 
look,"  returned  Carabine. 

"Paris  has  caught  me,"  said  Gazonal  to  himself,  as  he 
caught  sight  of  Jenny  Cadine,  and  went  to  pay  his  respects 
to  her. 

"And  what  should  /  have?"  asked  the  actress. 

"  Why,  my  whole  fortune  !  "  cried  Gazonal,  shrewdly  of  the 
opinion  that  to  offer  all  was  to  offer  nothing. 

Massol,  Claud  Vignon,  du  Tillet,  Maxime  de  Trailles, 
Nucingen,  Du  Bruel,  Malaga,  M.  and  Mme.  Gaillard,  Vau- 
vinet,  and  a  host  of  others  crowded  in. 

In  the  course  of  conversation,  Massol  and  Gazonal  went  to 
the  bottom  of  the  dispute ;  the  former,  without  committing 
himself,  remarked  that  the  report  was  not  yet  drawn  up,  and 
that  citizens  might  put  confidence  in  the  lights  and  the  inde- 
pendent opinion  of  the  Council  of  State.  After  this  cut-and- 
dried  response,  Gazonal,  losing  hope,  judged  it  necessary  to 
win  over  the  charming  Jenny  Cadine,  with  whom  he  fell  head 
over  ears  in  love.  Le'on  de  Lora  and  Bixiou  left  their  victim 
in  the  clutches  of  the  most  mischief-loving  woman  in  their 
singular  set,  for  Jenny  Cadine  was  the  famous  Dejazet's  sole 
rival. 

At  the  supper-table  Gazonal  was  fascinated  by  the  work  of 
Froment  Meurice,  the  modern  Benvenuto  Cellini— by  costly 
plate,  with  contents  worth  the  interest  on  the  wrought  silver 
that  held  them.  The  two  perpetrators  of  the  hoax  had  taken 


406  THE    UNCONSCIOUS  MUMMERS. 

care  to  sit  as  far  away  from  him  as  possible ;  but  furtively 
they  watched  the  wily  actress'  progress.  Ensnared  by  that 
insidious  hint  of  new  furniture,  she  had  set  herself  to  carry 
Gazonal  home  with  her;  and  never  did  lamb  in  the  Fete- 
Dieu  procession  submit  to  be  led  by  his  St.  John  the  Baptist 
with  a  better  grace  than  Gazonal  showed  in  his  obedience  to 
this  siren. 

Three  days  afterward,  Leon  and  Bixiou  having  meanwhile 
seen  and  heard  nothing  of  their  friend,  repaired  to  his  lodging 
about  two  o'clock  in  the  afternoon. 

"Well,  cousin,  the  decision  has  been  given  in  your  favor." 

"Alas!  it  makes  no  difference  now,  cousin,"  Gazonal  an- 
swered, turning  his  melancholy  eyes  upon  them;  "I  have 
turned  Republican  again." 

"  Wh— what  ?  "  asked  Leon. 

"I  have  nothing  left,  not  even  enough  to  pay  my  counsel. 
Madame  Jenny  Cadine  holds  bills  of  mine  for  more  than  I 
am  worth " 


"It  is  a  fact  that  Cadine  is  rather  expensive,  but- 


"  Oh  !  I  have  had  my  money's  worth.  Ah  !  what  a  woman ! 
After  all,  Paris  is  too  much  for  a  provincial.  I  am  about  to 
retire  to  La  Trappe." 

"Good,"  said  Bixiou.  "Now  you  talk  sensibly.  Here, 
acknowledge  the  sovereign  power  of  the  capital " 

"And  of  capital!"  cried  Leon,  holding  out  Gazonal's 
bills. 

Gazonal  stared  at  the  papers  in  bewilderment. 

"You  cannot  say  that  we  have  no  notion  of  hospitality; 
we  have  educated  you,  rescued  you  from  want,  treated  you, 
and — amused  you,"  said  Bixiou. 

"And  nothing  to  pay  !  "  added  Leon,  with  the  gesture  by 
which  a  street  boy  conveys  the  idea  that  somebody  has  been 
successfully  "done." 

PARIS,  November,  1845. 


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SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 

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from  which  it  was  borrowed. 


A     000525463 


